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PYTHON AND BATCH SCRIPT: Run file if it exists and create if it doesn't

Full Disclaimer: I DO NOT KNOW PYTHON.
Hi Guys,
I have made an AutoHotKey Script for my volume keys. I would like to create a batch file which runs a python file (so if I change computers, I can easily create this scripts) which would do the following
Check if volume_keys.ahk exists in the D Drive
If it exists, run that;
If it doesn't exist, then create a file named volume_keys.ahk and add my script to it.
My script is:
^!NumpadMult::Send {Volume_Mute}
^!NumpadAdd::Send {Volume_Up}
^!NumpadSub::Send {Volume_Down}
I know how to code the .bat file and just need help for the python point-of-view, but I request the community to check it:
#ECHO OFF
ECHO This script will run an AHK Script. If you want to stop this process from happening, then cross this window off.If you want to continye:
pause
cd d:
D:\run_volume_keys_ahk_script.py
I really appreciate any help by the community.
Thanks in advance

You can use the os library for this. Here's what the python program would look like.
import os
if os.path.isfile('D:\\volume_keys.ahk'): # check if it exists
os.system('D:\\volume_keys.ahk') # execute it
else:
with open('D:\\volume_keys.ahk', 'w') as f: # open it in w (write) mode
f.write('^!NumpadMult::Send {Volume_Mute} \
^!NumpadAdd::Send {Volume_Up} \
^!NumpadSub::Send {Volume_Down}') # Write to file
os.system('D:\\volume_keys.ahk') # execute

To activate the ahk script, you might want to use the subprocess module, of which I took the example from here
import subprocess
subprocess.call(["path/to/ahk.exe", "script.ahk"])
Note that you'll have to find the ahk executable on a computer before you can use the script, maybe you want to automatically check that too.
You can set the path you want to check for scripts in one string, and then add the filenames of your scripts as strings to a list. You can use listdir() from the os module to see any files and directories at a given path, then iterate over your scriptnames and check if it exists in that list of files. If it does, run it.
In this example I copy-pasted your script into a string as value for the key 'scriptname' in a dictionary, so that python can actually create the script file. This isn't really a neat way to do it though, you might want to have your scripts prepared in a directory next to your python script and copy them from there. See an example of how here
from os import listdir
from os.path import isfile, join
CHECK_PATH = "D:"
AHK_EXECUTABLE_PATH = "path/to/ahk.exe"
SCRIPTS_TO_CHECK = {'script1.ahk':"""^!NumpadMult::Send {Volume_Mute}
^!NumpadAdd::Send {Volume_Up}
^!NumpadSub::Send {Volume_Down} """, 'script2.ahk':" some other script here"}
files_to_check = set(listdir(CHECK_PATH)) # using a set for fast lookup later
for scriptname, script in SCRIPTS_TO_CHECK.items():
if not scriptname in files_to_check:
print(f"script {scriptname} not found, creating it.")
with open(scriptname, 'w') as file:
file.write(script)
# else
subprocess.call(AHK_EXECUTABLE_PATH, scriptname)

How to run a url from inside a python script to command line?

I have this command line text that I want to run inside my python script to the command line. Any suggestions on how to do this?
explorer "ms-drive-to:?
destination.latitude=47.680504&destination.longitude=-122.328262&destination.name=Green Lake"

If you want to effectively run this in python shell,like this: # it will open windows map
>>> !explorer "ms-drive-to:?
destination.latitude=47.680504&destination.longitude=-122.328262&destination.name=Green Lake"
If you want to run in code, do like others method.All the answers are correct.
import os
command_str = 'explorer "ms-drive-to:? destination.latitude=47.680504&destination.longitude=-122.328262&destination.name=Green Lake"'
os.system(command_str)
# it will open windows map, and driving directions to Green Lake from your current location.
Be careful to use double quotes, single quotes will not be recognized correctly!
windows uwp info: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/uwp/launch-resume/launch-maps-app

Sure, you can do something like is described in this post:
https://raspberrypi.stackexchange.com/questions/17017/how-do-i-run-a-command-line-command-in-a-python-script
Seems like you should use subprocess:
Running Bash commands in Python

Can't get working command line on prompt to work on subprocess

I need to extract text from a PDF. I tried the PyPDF2, but the textExtract method returned an encrypted text, even though the pdf is not encrypted acoording to the isEncrypted method.
So I moved on to trying accessing a program that does the job from the command prompt, so I could call it from python with the subprocess module. I found this program called textExtract, which did the job I wanted with the following command line on cmd:
"textextract.exe" "download.pdf" /to "download.txt"
However, when I tried running it with subprocess I couldn't get a 0 return code.
Here is the code I tried:
textextract = shlex.split(r'"textextract.exe" "download.pdf" /to "download.txt"')
subprocess.run(textextract)
I already tried it with shell=True, but it didn't work.
Can anyone help me?

I was able to get the following script to work from the command line after installing the PDF2Text Pilot application you're trying to use:
import shlex
import subprocess
args = shlex.split(r'"textextract.exe" "download.pdf" /to "download.txt"')
print('args:', args)
subprocess.run(args)
Sample screen output of running it from a command line session:
> C:\Python3\python run-textextract.py
args: ['textextract.exe', 'download.pdf', '/to', 'download.txt']
Progress:
Text from "download.pdf" has been successfully extracted...
Text extraction has been completed!
The above output was generated using Python 3.7.0.
I don't know if your use of spyder on anaconda affects things or not since I'm not familiar with it/them. If you continue to have problems with this, then, if it's possible, I suggest you see if you can get things working directly—i.e. running the the Python interpreter on the script manually from the command line similar to what's shown above. If that works, but using spyder doesn't, then you'll at least know the cause of the problem.

There's no need to build a string of quoted strings and then parse that back out to a list of strings. Just create a list and pass that:
command=["textextract.exe", "download.pdf", "/to", "download.txt"]
subprocess.run(command)
All that shlex.split is doing is creating a list by removing all of the quotes you had to add when creating the string in the first place. That's an extra step that provides no value over just creating the list yourself.

Applying a perl script to every file in a directory and obtain output using Python

I am trying to make a python script that will open a directory, apply a perl script to every file in that directory and get its out put in either multiple text files or just one.
I currently have:
import shlex, subprocess
arg_str = "perl tilt.pl *.pdb > final.txt"
arg = shlex.split(arg_str)
import os
framespdb = os.listdir("prac_frames")
for frames in framespdb:
subprocess.Popen(arg, stdout=True)
I keep getting *.pdb not found. I am very new to all of this so any help trying to complete this script would help.

*.pdb not found means exactly that - there won't be a *.pdb in whatever directory you're running the script... and as I read the code - I don't see anything to imply it's within 'frames' when it runs the perl script.
you probably need os.chdir(path) before the Popen.
How do I "cd" in Python?
...using a python script to run somewhat dubious syscalls to perl may offend some people but everyone's done it.. aside from that I'd point out:
always specify full paths (this becomes a problem if you will later say, want to run your job automatically from cron or an environment that doesn't have your PATH).
i.e. 'which perl' - put that full path in.
./.pdb would be better but not as good as the fullpath/.pdb (which you could use instead of the os.chdir option).

subprocess.Popen(arg, stdout=True)
does not expand filename wildcards. To handle your *.pdb, use shell=True.

Call a cmd.exe bat.-like command with python

i need some help with this...
I have a program installed on my computer that i want to call to calculate some things and give me an output-file...
in Matlab the command "dos()" does the job giving me also the cmd screen output in matlab.
I need this to work in python but i am making something wrong.
data='file.csv -v'
db=' -d D:\directory\bla\something.db'
anw='"D:\Program Files\bla\path\to\anw.exe"' + db + ' -i' + data
"anw" output is this one:
>>> anw
'"D:\\Program Files\\bla\\path\\to\\anw.exe" -d D:\\directory\\bla\\something.db -i file.csv -v'
## without the "" it does not work either
import subprocess as sb
p= sb.Popen('cmd','/K', anw) ## '/C' does not work either
i get the following error message from cmd.exe inside the python shell
Windows cannot find "\"D:\Program Files\bla\path\to\anw.exe"" Make sure you typed the name correctly, and then try again.
this line runs when i make a bat. file out of it.
it runs in matlab via "dos(anw)" so what is wrong here?
ps: i have blanks in my command... could this be the problem? i do not know where the first "\" comes from in the cmd. exe error message

for now i created a bat. file with all the stuff cmx.de should do in the specific directory where the input file lies...
i just had to tell python to change directory with
import os
os.chdir("D:\working\directory")
os.system(r'D:\working\directory\commands.bat')
it works good and gives me the output of cmd directly in the python shell