Write only the output from the console command - c#

I'm trying to build a .net application that will run some console commands (like running phantomJs) and return me the outcome of the operations. But by default I'm getting everything from the starting of cmd.exe to closing it. Any ideas for a quick fix or do I need to play with regexes ?
Here's my code as for now :
System.Diagnostics.ProcessStartInfo psi = new System.Diagnostics.ProcessStartInfo("cmd.exe");
psi.UseShellExecute = false;
psi.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
psi.RedirectStandardInput = true;
psi.RedirectStandardError = true;
System.Diagnostics.Process proc = System.Diagnostics.Process.Start(psi);
System.IO.StreamReader sOut = proc.StandardOutput;
System.IO.StreamWriter sIn = proc.StandardInput;
sIn.WriteLine("phantomjs -v");
sIn.WriteLine("EXIT");
proc.Close();
string results = sOut.ReadToEnd().Trim();
sIn.Close();
sOut.Close();

PhantomJS is an executable (according to their docs) - why not execute that directly rather than running cmd.exe? That will avoid the cmd.exe noise.
Or redirect the output of phantomjs to a log file and load the log file.
Or if you absolutely have to use cmd.exe and can't redirect ... I'd maybe throw some echo sentinels around the phantomjs to serve as parse start/stop points.
e.g.,
echo PARSE START
runcommand.exe
echo PARSE STOP
But don't do that.

Instead of using the different streams. Why not use cmd as filename and pass it the -c "phantomjs -v" as argument. Then use proc.StandardOutput.ReadToEnd() to grab everything that is outputted in the console. This should leave out unneeded info as it only reads what the output of the executed command is.
Following code might not work, but should give you the general idea.
ProcessStartInfo psi = new ProcessStartInfo();
psi.FileName = "cmd";
psi.Arguments = "/c \"phantomjs -v\"";
psi.UseShellExecute = false;
psi.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
// Optional other options
Process proc = Process.Start(psi);
string output = proc.StandardOutput.ReadToEnd();
proc.WaitForExit();

If you are on an unix machine:
sIn.WriteLine("phantomjs -v > /dev/null");
Windows:
sIn.WriteLine("phantomjs -v > NUL");

I hope that the following would be helpful!
{
Process xyProcess = new Process();
xyProcess.StartInfo.FileName = "FilenameYouWant";
xyProcess.StartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
xyProcess.StartInfo.CreateNoWindow = true;
xyProcess.StartInfo.WindowStyle = ProcessWindowStyle.Hidden;
xyProcess.StartInfo.RedirectStandardInput = true;
xyProcess.StartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
xyProcess.StartInfo.RedirectStandardError = true;
xyProcess.StartInfo.Arguments += "any arg1 you want ";
xyProcess.StartInfo.Arguments += "any arg2 you want ";
xyProcess.EnableRaisingEvents = true;
xyProcess.OutputDataReceived += process_DataReceived;
// Start the process
xyProcess.Start();
xyProcess.BeginErrorReadLine();
xyProcess.BeginOutputReadLine();
xyProcess.WaitForExit();
}
static private void process_DataReceived(object sender, DataReceivedEventArgs e)
{
//Catch the process response here
}

Related

c# OutputDataReceived does not work with curl

Following is the code to use OutputDataReceived to capture verbose information from curl.
There is no information can be captured this way. What is wrong?
var command = "curl.exe -vs -o test.html https:\\www.google.com";
var procStartInfo = new ProcessStartInfo("cmd", "/c " + command);
procStartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
procStartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
procStartInfo.CreateNoWindow = true;
var proc = new Process();
proc.EnableRaisingEvents = true;
proc.OutputDataReceived += (s, e) => {if(!string.IsNullOrEmpty(e.Data)) textBoxLog.AppendText(e.Data); };
proc.StartInfo = procStartInfo;
proc.Start();
proc.BeginOutputReadLine();
proc.WaitForExit();
proc.Close();
--output (or -o) writes the downloaded content into the given file (instead of writing it into stdout). The rest of cURL's output (progress meter, error messages, verbose mode etc.) is still written into stderr, which is shown in the terminal. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_streams
This means that you can only see the output of the HTML in C# with OutputDataReceived but not the output made by the verbose mode.
This code in a running console application, prints all the verbose info to the console without writing it manually with Console.WriteLine():
System.Diagnostics.Process process = new System.Diagnostics.Process();
System.Diagnostics.ProcessStartInfo startInfo = new System.Diagnostics.ProcessStartInfo();
startInfo.WindowStyle = System.Diagnostics.ProcessWindowStyle.Hidden;
startInfo.FileName = #"C:\Windows\System32\curl.exe";
startInfo.Arguments = #"https://vi.stackexchange.com/ -vs";
startInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
process.StartInfo = startInfo;
process.Start();
You could save the output of the verbose mode to a txt file with curl through the help of a bat in this way:
curl https://vi.stackexchange.com/ -vs >curl-output.txt 2>&1
Or you could read the StandardError stream with ErrorDataReceived.
I would recommend to use the HttpWebRequest as shown on this question instead of using curl to do a request as a Process, unless you have a specific reason.
Thanks Malware Werewolf for pointing me to the right direction. The verbose info is stderr, not stdout. Following is corrected code to capture the verbose info.
var command = "curl.exe -vs -o test.html https:\\www.google.com";
var procStartInfo = new ProcessStartInfo("cmd", "/c " + command);
procStartInfo.RedirectStandardError = true;
procStartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
procStartInfo.CreateNoWindow = true;
var proc = new Process();
proc.EnableRaisingEvents = true;
proc.ErrorDataReceived += (s, e) => {if(!string.IsNullOrEmpty(e.Data)) textBoxLog.AppendText(e.Data); };
proc.StartInfo = procStartInfo;
proc.Start();
proc.BeginErrorReadLine();
proc.WaitForExit();
proc.Close();

Executing netstat from C# app returns "File Not Found" error

I am trying to execute netstat command from my C# code and get "File Not Found" error.
Do I have to specify where "netstat.exe" is?
If so, how would I do it if (hypothetically) netstat and findstr are in two different folders?
Process cmd = new Process();
cmd.StartInfo.FileName = "netstat -a | findstr 5840";
cmd.StartInfo.RedirectStandardInput = true;
cmd.StartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
cmd.StartInfo.CreateNoWindow = true;
cmd.StartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
try
{
cmd.Start();
}
catch (System.ComponentModel.Win32Exception ex)
{
Console.WriteLine(ex.Message);
}
cmd.StandardInput.Flush();
cmd.StandardInput.Close();
cmd.WaitForExit();
StreamReader reader = cmd.StandardOutput;
string output = reader.ReadToEnd();
Console.WriteLine(output);
This is what fixed the problem:
// create the ProcessStartInfo using "cmd" as the program to be run and "/c " as the parameters.
// /c tells cmd that we want it to execute the command that follows and then exit.
string command = "netstat -a | findstr " + sTCPPort;
ProcessStartInfo procStartInfo = new ProcessStartInfo("cmd", "/c " + command);
// The following commands are needed to redirect the standard output.
// This means that it will be redirected to the Process.StandardOutput StreamReader.
procStartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
procStartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
// Do not create the black window.
procStartInfo.CreateNoWindow = true;
// Now we create a process, assign its ProcessStartInfo and start it
Process proc = new Process();
proc.StartInfo = procStartInfo;
proc.Start();
// Get the output into a string
result = proc.StandardOutput.ReadToEnd();
Without seeing the exact it is hard to know the exact issue, but it looks like you may need to cmd.exe and pass your command to it as an argument.

C# Piping Linux Command Output in Process

I am having trouble with the Process class to pipe a command on a Linux system.
I want to execute the following command: rpm2cpio repo.rpm | cpio -divm
I've tried
process.StartInfo.FileName = "rpm2cpio;
rocess.StartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
process.StartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
process.StartInfo.Arguments = "repo.rpm | cpio - idmv";
But the program hangs.
Similarly, I tried saving the output from rpm2cpio to a string or an output file and then pass that as the argument for the cpio command, but it also hangs.
process.StartInfo.FileName = "cpio";
rocess.StartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
process.StartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
process.StartInfo.Arguments = "-idvm < output.txt";
// or
process.StartInfo.Arguments = "-idvm < " + rp2cpio_output;
What are some ways I can get this working? I saw this post with a solution, but it is on a Window's system. How do the same thing on Linux?
Setting process.StartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput=true will cause the program to redirect standard output to the stream process.StartInfo.StandardOutput. When this happens the program will hang until you read from standard output.
To get the behavior I think you are looking for, you just need to set RedirectStandardOutput=false. That way the pipes and redirects in your command will work as expected.
Rather than directly writing to a file, you can simply use a StreamWriter to fetch the output in a stream buffer and then use that to write to the file. If the process still hangs, simply use the timeout command of linux to terminate the process.
The following snippet may help after making a few changes:
ProcessStartInfo processStartInfo = new ProcessStartInfo();
processStartInfo.WindowStyle = ProcessWindowStyle.Hidden;
processStartInfo.FileName = "/bin/bash";
processStartInfo.WorkingDirectory = "/";
string cmd = "timeout 1 cat > temp.txt";
var escapedArgs = cmd.Replace("\"", "\\\"");
processStartInfo.Arguments = $"-c \"{escapedArgs}\"";
processStartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
processStartInfo.RedirectStandardInput = true;
processStartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
processStartInfo.RedirectStandardError = true;
processStartInfo.StandardErrorEncoding = System.Text.Encoding.UTF8;
processStartInfo.StandardInputEncoding = System.Text.Encoding.UTF8;
processStartInfo.StandardOutputEncoding = System.Text.Encoding.UTF8;
processStartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
process.StartInfo = processStartInfo;
process.Start();
stdIOWriter = process.StandardInput;
stdIOWriter.WriteLine("Hey Fellas");
String error = process.StandardError.ReadToEnd();
String output = process.StandardOutput.ReadToEnd(); ```

C# - Launch application with arguments.

Hello I've to Launch the software CFast for a Parametric Analysis. To do this, I want to create a application in C# that runs the core CFast.exe. If I want run the software from cmd.exe and execute it on the file INPUTFILENAME.in I write in prompt:
CFast.exe INPUTFILENAME
In C# I wrote the following code:
Process firstProc = new Process();
firstProc.StartInfo.FileName = #"C:\Users\Alberto\Desktop\Simulazioni Cfast\D\C\N\A3B1\CFAST.exe";
firstProc.StartInfo.Arguments = #"INPUTFILENAME";
firstProc.EnableRaisingEvents = true;
firstProc.Start();
firstProc.WaitForExit();
With this code CFast run but doesn't analyze anything... Seems like don't accept the argument. Hint for this trouble ?
Solved. Mistake in the filename and in the syntax of the command
// setup cmd process
var command = #"CFAST.exe C:\Users\Alberto\Desktop\Simulazioni_Cfast\D\C\N\A3B1\A3B1";
ProcessStartInfo procStartInfo = new ProcessStartInfo("cmd", "/c " + command);
procStartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
procStartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
procStartInfo.RedirectStandardError = true;
procStartInfo.CreateNoWindow = true;
// start process
Process proc = new Process();
proc.StartInfo = procStartInfo;
proc.Start();
proc.WaitForExit();
// read process output
string cmdError = proc.StandardError.ReadToEnd();
string cmdOutput = proc.StandardOutput.ReadToEnd();
where A3B1 is the name of the file .IN

How to hide cmd window while running a batch file?

How to hide cmd window while running a batch file?
I use the following code to run batch file
process = new Process();
process.StartInfo.FileName = batchFilePath;
process.Start();
If proc.StartInfo.UseShellExecute is false, then you are launching the process and can use:
proc.StartInfo.CreateNoWindow = true;
If proc.StartInfo.UseShellExecute is true, then the OS is launching the process and you have to provide a "hint" to the process via:
proc.StartInfo.WindowStyle = ProcessWindowStyle.Hidden;
However the called application may ignore this latter request.
If using UseShellExecute = false, you might want to consider redirecting standard output/error, to capture any logging produced:
proc.StartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
proc.StartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
proc.OutputDataReceived += new DataReceivedEventHandler(ProcessOutputHandler);
proc.StartInfo.RedirectStandardError = true;
proc.ErrorDataReceived += new DataReceivedEventHandler(ProcessOutputHandler);
And have a function like
private void ProcessOutputHandler(object sendingProcess, DataReceivedEventArgs outLine)
{
if (!String.IsNullOrEmpty(outLine.Data)) // use the output outLine.Data somehow;
}
There's a good page covering CreateNoWindow this on an MSDN blog.
There is also a bug in Windows which may throw a dialog and defeat CreateNoWindow if you are passing a username/password. For details
http://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/ViewFeedback.aspx?FeedbackID=98476
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=818858
According to the Process properties, you do have a:
Property: CreateNoWindow
Notes: Allows you to run a command line program silently.
It does not flash a console window.
and:
Property: WindowStyle
Notes: Use this to set windows as hidden.
The author has used ProcessWindowStyle.Hidden often.
As an example!
static void LaunchCommandLineApp()
{
// For the example
const string ex1 = "C:\\";
const string ex2 = "C:\\Dir";
// Use ProcessStartInfo class
ProcessStartInfo startInfo = new ProcessStartInfo();
startInfo.CreateNoWindow = false;
startInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
startInfo.FileName = "dcm2jpg.exe";
startInfo.WindowStyle = ProcessWindowStyle.Hidden;
startInfo.Arguments = "-f j -o \"" + ex1 + "\" -z 1.0 -s y " + ex2;
try
{
// Start the process with the info we specified.
// Call WaitForExit and then the using statement will close.
using (Process exeProcess = Process.Start(startInfo))
{
exeProcess.WaitForExit();
}
}
catch
{
// Log error.
}
}
Use:
process.StartInfo.WindowStyle = ProcessWindowStyle.Hidden;
This is what worked for me,
When you redirect all of the input and output, and set the window hidden it should work
Process p = new Process();
p.StartInfo.RedirectStandardError = true;
p.StartInfo.RedirectStandardInput = true;
p.StartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
p.StartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
p.StartInfo.CreateNoWindow = true;
try with this and this where the c# code is embedded into the batch files:
#echo off
echo self minimizing
call getCmdPid.bat
call windowMode.bat -pid %errorlevel% -mode minimized
echo --other commands--
pause
Though it might be not so easy to unhide the window.

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