platform.linux_distribution()

platform.linux_distribution(distname='', version='', id='', supported_dists=('SuSE', 'debian', 'redhat', 'mandrake', ...), full_distribution_name=1)

Tries to determine the name of the Linux OS distribution name.

supported_dists may be given to define the set of Linux distributions to look for. It defaults to a list of currently supported Linux distributions identified by their release file name.

If full_distribution_name is true (default), the full distribution read from the OS is returned. Otherwise the short name taken from supported_dists is used.

Returns a tuple (distname,version,id) which defaults to the args given as parameters. id is the item in parentheses after the version number. It is usually the version codename.