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I'm working on a wrapper script that will exercise a vmware executable, allowing for the automation of virtual machine startup/shutdown/register/deregister actions. I'm trying to use subprocess to handle invoking the executable, but the spaces in the executables path and in parameters of the executable are not being handled correctly by subprocess. Below is a code fragment:
vmrun_cmd = r"c:/Program Files/VMware/VMware Server/vmware-cmd.bat"
def vm_start(target_vm):
list_arg = "start"
list_arg2 = "hard"
if vm_list(target_vm):
p = Popen([vmrun_cmd, target_vm, list_arg, list_arg2], stdout=PIPE).communicate()[0]
print p
else:
vm_register(target_vm)
vm_start(target_vm)
def vm_list2(target_vm):
list_arg = "-l"
p = Popen([vmrun_cmd, list_arg], stdout=PIPE).communicate()[0]
for line in p.split('\n'):
print line
If I call the vm_list2 function, I get the following output:
$ ./vmware_control.py --list
C:\Virtual Machines\QAW2K3Server\Windows Server 2003 Standard Edition.vmx
C:\Virtual Machines\ubunturouter\Ubuntu.vmx
C:\Virtual Machines\vacc\vacc.vmx
C:\Virtual Machines\EdgeAS-4.4.x\Other Linux 2.4.x kernel.vmx
C:\Virtual Machines\UbuntuServer1\Ubuntu.vmx
C:\Virtual Machines\Other Linux 2.4.x kernel\Other Linux 2.4.x kernel.vmx
C:\Virtual Machines\QAClient\Windows XP Professional.vmx
If I call the vm_start function, which requires a path-to-vm parameter, I get the following output:
$ ./vmware_control.py --start "C:\Virtual Machines\ubunturouter\Ubuntu.vmx"
'c:\Program' is not recognized as an internal or external command,
operable program or batch file.
Apparently, the presence of a second parameter with embedded spaces is altering the way that subprocess is interpreting the first parameter. Any suggestions on how to resolve this?
python2.5.2/cygwin/winxp
If you have spaces in the path, the easiest way I've found to get them interpreted properly is this.
subprocess.call('""' + path + '""')
I don't know why exactly it needs double double quotes, but that is what works.
I believe that list2cmdline(), which is doing the processing of your list args, splits any string arg on whitespace unless the string contains double quotes. So I would expect
vmrun_cmd = r'"c:/Program Files/VMware/VMware Server/vmware-cmd.bat"'
to be what you want.
You'll also likely want to surround the other arguments (like target_vm) in double quotes on the assumption that they, too, each represent a distinct arg to present to the command line. Something like
r'"%s"' % target_vm
(for example) should suit.
See the list2cmdline documentation
'c:\Program' is not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program or batch file.
To get this message, you are either:
Using shell=True:
vmrun_cmd = r"c:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Server\vmware-cmd.bat"
subprocess.Popen(vmrun_cmd, shell=True)
Changing vmrun_cmd on other part of your code
Getting this error from something inside vmware-cmd.bat
Things to try:
Open a python prompt, run the following command:
subprocess.Popen([r"c:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Server\vmware-cmd.bat"])
If that works, then quoting issues are out of the question. If not, you've isolated the problem.
In Python on MS Windows, the subprocess.Popen class uses the CreateProcess API to started the process. CreateProcess takes a string rather than something like an array of arguments. Python uses subprocess.list2cmdline to convert the list of args to a string for CreateProcess.
If I were you, I'd see what subprocess.list2cmdline(args) returns (where args is the first argument of Popen). It would be interesting to see if it is putting quotes around the first argument.
Of course, this explanation might not apply in a Cygwin environment.
Having said all this, I don't have MS Windows.
One problem is that if the command is surrounded with quotes and doesn't have spaces, that could also confuse the shell.
So I do this:
if ' ' in raw_cmd:
fmt = '"%s"'
else:
fmt = '%s'
cmd = fmt % raw_cmd
That was quite a hard problem for the last three ours....nothing stated so far did work, neither using r"" or Popen with a list and so on. What did work in the end was a combination of format string and r"". So my solution is this:
subprocess.Popen("{0} -f {1}".format(pathToExe, r'"%s"' % pathToVideoFileOrDir))
where both variables pathToExe and pathToVideoFileOrDir have whitespaces in their path. Using \" within the formatted string did not work and resulted in the same error that the first path is not detected any longer correctly.
Possibly stupid suggestion, but perhaps try the following, to remove subprocess + spaces from the equation:
import os
from subprocess Popen, PIPE
os.chdir(
os.path.join("C:", "Program Files", "VMware", "VMware Server")
)
p = Popen(
["vmware-cmd.bat", target_vm, list_arg, list_arg2],
stdout=PIPE
).communicate()[0]
It might also be worth trying..
p = Popen(
[os.path.join("C:", "Program Files", "VMware", "VMware Server", "vmware-cmd.bat"), ...
You probably don't want to use Pipe
If the output of the subprogram is greater than 64KB it is likely your process will crash.
http://thraxil.org/users/anders/posts/2008/03/13/Subprocess-Hanging-PIPE-is-your-enemy/
Subprocess.Popen has a keyword argument shell, making it as if the shell has been parsing your arguments, setting shell=True should do what you want.
Why are you using r""? I believe that if you remove the "r" from the beginning, it will be treated as a standard string which may contain spaces. Python should then properly quote the string when sending it to the shell.
Here's what I don't like
vmrun_cmd = r"c:/Program Files/VMware/VMware Server/vmware-cmd.bat"
You've got spaces in the name of the command itself -- which is baffling your shell. Hence the "'c:\Program' is not recognized as an internal or external command,
operable program or batch file."
Option 1 -- put your .BAT file somewhere else. Indeed, put all your VMWare somewhere else. Here's the rule: Do Not Use "Program Files" Directory For Anything. It's just wrong.
Option 2 -- quote the vmrun_cmd value
vmrun_cmd = r'"c:/Program Files/VMware/VMware Server/vmware-cmd.bat"'
Just started Python again and now I'm already stuck on the following...
I'm trying to use subprocess.Popen with a variable with a whitespace in it (a Windows path).
Doing a print on the variable the variable seems to work fine. But when using the variable in subprocess.Popen, the variable is cut off by the first whitespace.
Below a part of the script (the variable 'image_file' contains the Windows Path(s) with spaces)
def start_phone(image_file):
cmd = tar_exe + " -tf "+ image_file
print (cmd)
subprocess.Popen(cmd, shell=True)
How can I use subprocess with a variable with whitespaces (path) in it?
You can either put double quotes around each argument with potential white spaces in it:
cmd = f'"{tar_exe}" -tf "{image_file}"'
subprocess.Popen(cmd, shell=True)
or don't use shell=True and instead put arguments in a list:
subprocess.Popen([tar_exe, '-tf', image_file])
If you take a look at the subprocess documentation you'll see that arguments must be provided to subprocess commands in the form of a list, so your code sample should look like
def start_phone(image_file):
subprocess.Popen([tar_exe, "-tf", image_file])
I try to move some dos command from my batch file into python but get this error, The filename, directory name, or volume label syntax is incorrect, for the following statement.
subprocess.Popen('rd /s /q .\ProcessControlSimulator\bin', shell=True,
stdout=subprocess.PIPE, stderr=subprocess.STDOUT)
if I just copy that dos command into window console, it works. The os.getcwd() gave me expected working directory.
My questions are:
1. why is that?
2. how to avoid that? do I need to get current working directory and construct an abstract path for that command? how to do that?
thanks
\ (backslash) is an escape character within string constants, so your string ends up changed. Use double \s (like so \\) within string constants:
subprocess.Popen('rd /s /q .\\ProcessControlSimulator\\bin', shell=True, stdout=subprocess.PIPE, stderr=subprocess.STDOUT)
My advice is try not to use system commands unnecessarily. You are using Python, so use the available modules that come with it. From what i see, you are trying to remove directories right? Then you can use modules like shutil. Example:
import shutil
import os
path = os.path.join("c:\\","ProcessControlSimulator","bin") #example only
try:
shutil.rmtree(path)
except Exception,e:
print e
else:
print "removed"
there are others also, like os.removedirs, os.remove you can take a look at from the docs.
You've got unescaped backslashes. You can use a python raw string to avoid having to escape your slashes, or double them up:
subprocess.Popen(r'rd /s /q .\ProcessControlSimulator\bin', shell=True, stdout=subprocess.PIPE, stderr=subprocess.STDOUT)
or
subprocess.Popen('rd /s /q .\\ProcessControlSimulator\\bin', shell=True, stdout=subprocess.PIPE, stderr=subprocess.STDOUT)
You can't just copy it one-to-one. For example, your escape characters () become incorrect. You may need a double \ in this case.
Also, there are specific API calls for creating and killing directories, look at os.path
Update: When I use the subprocess.call instead of subprocess.Popen, the problem is solved - does anybody know what's the cause? And there came another problem: I can't seem to find a way to control the output... Is there a way to redirect the output from subprocess.call to a string or something like that? Thanks!
I'm trying to use Devenv to build projects, and it runs just fine when i type it in command prompt like devenv A.sln /build "Debug|Win32" - but when I use a python to run it using Popen(cmd,shell=true) where cmd is the same line as above, it shows nothing. If I remove the |, change it to "Debug" only, it works....
Does anybody know why this happens? I've tried putting a \ before |, but still nothing happened..
This is the code I am using:
from subprocess import Popen, PIPE
cmd = ' "C:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Visual Studio 8\\Common7\\IDE\\devenv" solution.sln /build "Debug|Win32" '
sys.stdout.flush()
p = Popen(cmd,shell=True,stdout=PIPE,stderr=PIPE)
lines = []
for line in p.stdout.readlines():
lines.append(line)
out = string.join(lines)
print out
if out.strip():
print out.strip('\n')
sys.stdout.flush()
...which doesn't work, however, if I swap Debug|Win32 with Debug, it works perfectly..
Thanks for every comment here
There is a difference between devenv.exe and devenv.com, both of which are executable and live in the same directory (sigh). The command lines used in the question and some answers don't say which they want so I'm not sure which will get used.
If you want to call from the command line then you need to ensure you use devenv.com, otherwise you're likely to get a GUI popping up. I think this might be the cause of some (but not all) of the confusion.
See section 17.1.5.1. in the python documentation.
On Windows, Python automatically adds the double quotes around the project configuration argument i.e Debug|win32 is passed as "Debug|win32" to devenv. You DON'T need to add the double quotes and you DON'T need to pass shell=True to Popen.
Use ProcMon to view the argument string passed to devenv.
When shell = False is used, it will treat the string as a single command, so you need to pass the command/arugments as a list.. Something like:
from subprocess import Popen, PIPE
cmd = [
r"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 8\Common7\IDE\devenv", # in raw r"blah" string, you don't need to escape backslashes
"solution.sln",
"/build",
"Debug|Win32"
]
p = Popen(cmd, stdout=PIPE, stderr=PIPE)
out = p.stdout.read() # reads full output into string, including line breaks
print out
try double quoting like: 'devenv A.sln /build "Debug|Win32"'
Looks like Windows' shell is taking that | as a pipe (despite the quotes and escapes). Have you tried shell=False instead?
I'm working on a wrapper script that will exercise a vmware executable, allowing for the automation of virtual machine startup/shutdown/register/deregister actions. I'm trying to use subprocess to handle invoking the executable, but the spaces in the executables path and in parameters of the executable are not being handled correctly by subprocess. Below is a code fragment:
vmrun_cmd = r"c:/Program Files/VMware/VMware Server/vmware-cmd.bat"
def vm_start(target_vm):
list_arg = "start"
list_arg2 = "hard"
if vm_list(target_vm):
p = Popen([vmrun_cmd, target_vm, list_arg, list_arg2], stdout=PIPE).communicate()[0]
print p
else:
vm_register(target_vm)
vm_start(target_vm)
def vm_list2(target_vm):
list_arg = "-l"
p = Popen([vmrun_cmd, list_arg], stdout=PIPE).communicate()[0]
for line in p.split('\n'):
print line
If I call the vm_list2 function, I get the following output:
$ ./vmware_control.py --list
C:\Virtual Machines\QAW2K3Server\Windows Server 2003 Standard Edition.vmx
C:\Virtual Machines\ubunturouter\Ubuntu.vmx
C:\Virtual Machines\vacc\vacc.vmx
C:\Virtual Machines\EdgeAS-4.4.x\Other Linux 2.4.x kernel.vmx
C:\Virtual Machines\UbuntuServer1\Ubuntu.vmx
C:\Virtual Machines\Other Linux 2.4.x kernel\Other Linux 2.4.x kernel.vmx
C:\Virtual Machines\QAClient\Windows XP Professional.vmx
If I call the vm_start function, which requires a path-to-vm parameter, I get the following output:
$ ./vmware_control.py --start "C:\Virtual Machines\ubunturouter\Ubuntu.vmx"
'c:\Program' is not recognized as an internal or external command,
operable program or batch file.
Apparently, the presence of a second parameter with embedded spaces is altering the way that subprocess is interpreting the first parameter. Any suggestions on how to resolve this?
python2.5.2/cygwin/winxp
If you have spaces in the path, the easiest way I've found to get them interpreted properly is this.
subprocess.call('""' + path + '""')
I don't know why exactly it needs double double quotes, but that is what works.
I believe that list2cmdline(), which is doing the processing of your list args, splits any string arg on whitespace unless the string contains double quotes. So I would expect
vmrun_cmd = r'"c:/Program Files/VMware/VMware Server/vmware-cmd.bat"'
to be what you want.
You'll also likely want to surround the other arguments (like target_vm) in double quotes on the assumption that they, too, each represent a distinct arg to present to the command line. Something like
r'"%s"' % target_vm
(for example) should suit.
See the list2cmdline documentation
'c:\Program' is not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program or batch file.
To get this message, you are either:
Using shell=True:
vmrun_cmd = r"c:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Server\vmware-cmd.bat"
subprocess.Popen(vmrun_cmd, shell=True)
Changing vmrun_cmd on other part of your code
Getting this error from something inside vmware-cmd.bat
Things to try:
Open a python prompt, run the following command:
subprocess.Popen([r"c:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Server\vmware-cmd.bat"])
If that works, then quoting issues are out of the question. If not, you've isolated the problem.
In Python on MS Windows, the subprocess.Popen class uses the CreateProcess API to started the process. CreateProcess takes a string rather than something like an array of arguments. Python uses subprocess.list2cmdline to convert the list of args to a string for CreateProcess.
If I were you, I'd see what subprocess.list2cmdline(args) returns (where args is the first argument of Popen). It would be interesting to see if it is putting quotes around the first argument.
Of course, this explanation might not apply in a Cygwin environment.
Having said all this, I don't have MS Windows.
One problem is that if the command is surrounded with quotes and doesn't have spaces, that could also confuse the shell.
So I do this:
if ' ' in raw_cmd:
fmt = '"%s"'
else:
fmt = '%s'
cmd = fmt % raw_cmd
That was quite a hard problem for the last three ours....nothing stated so far did work, neither using r"" or Popen with a list and so on. What did work in the end was a combination of format string and r"". So my solution is this:
subprocess.Popen("{0} -f {1}".format(pathToExe, r'"%s"' % pathToVideoFileOrDir))
where both variables pathToExe and pathToVideoFileOrDir have whitespaces in their path. Using \" within the formatted string did not work and resulted in the same error that the first path is not detected any longer correctly.
Possibly stupid suggestion, but perhaps try the following, to remove subprocess + spaces from the equation:
import os
from subprocess Popen, PIPE
os.chdir(
os.path.join("C:", "Program Files", "VMware", "VMware Server")
)
p = Popen(
["vmware-cmd.bat", target_vm, list_arg, list_arg2],
stdout=PIPE
).communicate()[0]
It might also be worth trying..
p = Popen(
[os.path.join("C:", "Program Files", "VMware", "VMware Server", "vmware-cmd.bat"), ...
You probably don't want to use Pipe
If the output of the subprogram is greater than 64KB it is likely your process will crash.
http://thraxil.org/users/anders/posts/2008/03/13/Subprocess-Hanging-PIPE-is-your-enemy/
Subprocess.Popen has a keyword argument shell, making it as if the shell has been parsing your arguments, setting shell=True should do what you want.
Why are you using r""? I believe that if you remove the "r" from the beginning, it will be treated as a standard string which may contain spaces. Python should then properly quote the string when sending it to the shell.
Here's what I don't like
vmrun_cmd = r"c:/Program Files/VMware/VMware Server/vmware-cmd.bat"
You've got spaces in the name of the command itself -- which is baffling your shell. Hence the "'c:\Program' is not recognized as an internal or external command,
operable program or batch file."
Option 1 -- put your .BAT file somewhere else. Indeed, put all your VMWare somewhere else. Here's the rule: Do Not Use "Program Files" Directory For Anything. It's just wrong.
Option 2 -- quote the vmrun_cmd value
vmrun_cmd = r'"c:/Program Files/VMware/VMware Server/vmware-cmd.bat"'