I have an input file called 0.in
. To get the output I do ./a.out < 0.in
in the Bash Shell.
Now, I have several such files (more than 500) and I want to automate this process using Python's subprocess module.
I tried doing this:
data=subprocess.Popen(['./a.out','< 0.in'],stdout=subprocess.PIPE,stdin=subprocess.PIPE).communicate()
Nothing was printed (data[0] was blank) when I ran this. What is the right method to do what I want to do?
Redirection using <
is a shell feature, not a python feature.
There are two choices:
Use shell=True
and let the shell handle redirection:
data = subprocess.Popen(['./a.out < 0.in'], stdout=subprocess.PIPE, shell=True).communicate()
Let python handle redirection:
with open('0.in') as f:
data = subprocess.Popen(['./a.out'], stdout=subprocess.PIPE, stdin=f).communicate()
The second option is usually preferred because it avoids the vagaries of the shell.
If you want to capture stderr in data
, then add stderr=subprocess.PIPE
to the Popen
command. Otherwise, stderr will appear on the terminal or wherever python's error messages are being sent.