The commands module has been removed. The getoutput() and getstatusoutput()

functions have been added to the subprocess module.

The fixer for this still needs to be written and proper Py3K deprecation
warnings for the functions that didn't make the transition need to be done in
2.6.

This is all part of trying to close issue #2872.

Doc/library/subprocess.rst

@@ -14,7 +14,6 @@ replace several other, older modules and functions, such as::
 
    os.system
    os.spawn*
-   commands.*
 
 Information about how the :mod:`subprocess` module can be used to replace these
 modules and functions can be found in the following sections.
@@ -113,7 +112,7 @@ This module defines one class called :class:`Popen`:
 Convenience Functions
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
 
-This module also defines two shortcut functions:
+This module also defines four shortcut functions:
 
 
 .. function:: call(*popenargs, **kwargs)
@@ -138,6 +137,35 @@ This module also defines two shortcut functions:
       check_call(["ls", "-l"])
 
 
+.. function:: getstatusoutput(cmd)
+   Return ``(status, output)`` of executing *cmd* in a shell.
+
+   Execute the string *cmd* in a shell with :func:`os.popen` and return a 2-tuple
+   ``(status, output)``.  *cmd* is actually run as ``{ cmd ; } 2>&1``, so that the
+   returned output will contain output or error messages.  A trailing newline is
+   stripped from the output.  The exit status for the command can be interpreted
+   according to the rules for the C function :cfunc:`wait`.  Example::
+
+      >>> import subprocess
+      >>> subprocess.getstatusoutput('ls /bin/ls')
+      (0, '/bin/ls')
+      >>> subprocess.getstatusoutput('cat /bin/junk')
+      (256, 'cat: /bin/junk: No such file or directory')
+      >>> subprocess.getstatusoutput('/bin/junk')
+      (256, 'sh: /bin/junk: not found')
+
+
+.. function:: getoutput(cmd)
+   Return output ``(stdout or stderr)`` of executing *cmd* in a shell.
+
+   Like :func:`getstatusoutput`, except the exit status is ignored and the return
+   value is a string containing the command's output.  Example::
+
+      >>> import subprocess
+      >>> subprocess.getoutput('ls /bin/ls')
+      '/bin/ls'
+
+
 Exceptions
 ^^^^^^^^^^