I need to call "/usr/bin/pdf2txt.py" with few arguments from my Perl script. How should i do this ?
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4 Answers
If you need to capture STDOUT:
my $ret = `/usr/bin/pdf2txt.py arg1 arg2`;
You can easily capture STDERR redirecting it to STDOUT:
my $ret = `/usr/bin/pdf2txt.py arg1 arg2 2>&1`;
If you need to capture the exit status, then you can use:
my $ret = system("/usr/bin/pdf2txt.py arg1 arg2");
Take in mind that both `` and system() block until the program finishes execution.
If you don't want to wait, or you need to capture both STDOUT/STDERR and exit status, then you should use IPC::Open3.
2 Comments
friedo
It's better to use
system '/usr/bin/pdf2txt.py', $arg1, $arg2 as this will avoid problems (and dangerous bugs) with shell interpolation.
Simon Pickup
You can capture both STDOUT and exit status using backticks using
$? For example: my $output = `/usr/bin/pdf2txt.py arg1 arg2 2>&1`; my $ret = $?;my $output = `/usr/bin/pdf2txt.py arg1 arg2`;
answered Jun 14, 2011 at 7:39
Blagovest Buyukliev
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1 Comment
damg
make sure the script is executable (chmod +x) and that it has a proper hashbang (e.g. #!/usr/bin/env python).
If you don't need the script output, but you want the return code, use system():
...
my $bin = "/usr/bin/pdf2txt.py";
my @args = qw(arg1 arg2 arg3);
my $cmd = "$bin ".join(" ", @args);
system ($cmd) == 0 or die "command was unable to run to completion:\n$cmd\n";
1 Comment
friedo
Don't join the
@args. Use system $bin, @args; - that avoids a number of potentially harmful bugs.IF you want to see output in "real time" and not when script has finished running , Add -u after python. example :
my $ret = system("python -u pdf2txt.py arg1 arg2");
