External Command

Run an external command and process stdout

regex cat-os cat-text-processing

Runs git log --oneline as an external std::process::Command⮳ and inspects its std::process::Output⮳ using regex::Regex⮳ to get the hash and message of the last 5 commits.

use std::process::Command;

use anyhow::bail;
use anyhow::Result;
use regex::Regex;

#[derive(PartialEq, Default, Clone, Debug)]
struct Commit {
    hash: String,
    message: String,
}

fn main() -> Result<()> {
    let output = Command::new("git").arg("log").arg("--oneline").output()?;

    if !output.status.success() {
        bail!("Command executed with failing error code");
    }

    let pattern = Regex::new(
        r"(?x)
        ([0-9a-fA-F]+) # commit hash
        (.*)           # The commit message",
    )?;

    String::from_utf8(output.stdout)?
        .lines()
        .filter_map(|line| pattern.captures(line))
        .map(|cap| Commit {
            hash: cap[1].to_string(),
            message: cap[2].trim().to_string(),
        })
        .take(5)
        .for_each(|x| println!("{:?}", x));

    Ok(())
}

Run an external command passing it stdin and check for an error code

std cat-os

Opens the python interpreter using an external std::process::Command⮳ and passes it a python statement for execution. std::process::Output⮳ of statement is then parsed.

use std::collections::HashSet;
use std::io::Write;
use std::process::Command;
use std::process::Stdio;

use anyhow::anyhow;
use anyhow::bail;
use anyhow::Result;

fn main() -> Result<()> {
    let mut child = Command::new("rev")
        .stdin(Stdio::piped())
        .stderr(Stdio::piped())
        .stdout(Stdio::piped())
        .spawn()?;

    child
        .stdin
        .as_mut()
        .ok_or(anyhow!("Child process stdin has not been captured!"))?
        .write_all(b"1234 56789")?;

    let output = child.wait_with_output()?;

    if output.status.success() {
        let raw_output = String::from_utf8(output.stdout)?;
        let words = raw_output
            .split_whitespace()
            .map(|s| s.to_lowercase())
            .collect::<HashSet<_>>();
        println!("Found {} unique words:", words.len());
        println!("{:#?}", words);
    } else {
        let err = String::from_utf8(output.stderr)?;
        bail!("External command failed:\n {}", err);
    }
    Ok(())
}

Run piped external commands

std cat-os

Shows up to the 10th biggest files and subdirectories in the current working directory. It is equivalent to running: du -ah. | sort -hr | head -n 10.

std::process::Command⮳ represent a process. Output of a child process is captured with a std::process::Stdio::piped⮳ between parent and child.


fn main() -> anyhow::Result<()> {
    use std::process::Command;
    use std::process::Stdio;

    let directory = std::env::current_dir()?;
    let mut du_output_child = Command::new("du")
        .arg("-ah")
        .arg(&directory)
        .stdout(Stdio::piped())
        .spawn()?;

    if let Some(du_output) = du_output_child.stdout.take() {
        let mut sort_output_child = Command::new("sort")
            .arg("-hr")
            .stdin(du_output)
            .stdout(Stdio::piped())
            .spawn()?;

        du_output_child.wait()?;

        if let Some(sort_output) = sort_output_child.stdout.take() {
            let head_output_child = Command::new("head")
                .args(["-n", "10"])
                .stdin(sort_output)
                .stdout(Stdio::piped())
                .spawn()?;

            let head_stdout = head_output_child.wait_with_output()?;

            sort_output_child.wait()?;

            println!(
                "Top 10 biggest files and directories in '{}':\n{}",
                directory.display(),
                String::from_utf8(head_stdout.stdout).unwrap()
            );
        }
    }

    Ok(())
}

Redirect both stdout and stderr of child process to the same file

std cat-os

Spawns a child process and redirects std::io::Stdout⮳ and std::io::Stderr⮳ to the same file. It follows the same idea as run piped external commands, however std::process::Stdio⮳ writes to a specified file. std::fs::File::try_clone⮳ references the same file handle for std::io::Stdout⮳ and std::io::Stderr⮳. It will ensure that both handles write with the same cursor position.

The below recipe is equivalent to run the Unix shell command ls . oops >out.txt 2>&1.


fn main() -> Result<(), std::io::Error> {
    use std::fs::File;
    use std::process::Command;
    use std::process::Stdio;

    let outputs = File::create("temp/out.txt")?;
    let errors = outputs.try_clone()?;

    Command::new("ls")
        .args([".", "oops"])
        .stdout(Stdio::from(outputs))
        .stderr(Stdio::from(errors))
        .spawn()?
        .wait_with_output()?;

    Ok(())
}

Continuously process child process' outputs

std cat-os

In Run an external command and process stdout, processing doesn't start until external std::process::Command is finished. The recipe below calls std::process::Stdio::piped to create a pipe, and reads std::io::Stdout⮳ continuously as soon as the std::io::BufReader⮳ is updated.

The below recipe is equivalent to the Unix shell command journalctl | grep usb.

use std::io::BufRead;
use std::io::BufReader;
use std::io::Error;
use std::io::ErrorKind;
use std::process::Command;
use std::process::Stdio;

fn main() -> Result<(), Error> {
    // NOTE: `systemd` should be installed for this example to work.
    let stdout = Command::new("journalctl")
        .stdout(Stdio::piped())
        .spawn()?
        .stdout
        .ok_or_else(|| {
            Error::new(
                ErrorKind::Other,
                "Could not capture standard
    output.",
            )
        })?;

    let reader = BufReader::new(stdout);

    reader
        .lines()
        .map_while(Result::ok)
        .filter(|line| line.contains("usb"))
        .for_each(|line| println!("{}", line));

    Ok(())
}

Read Environment Variable

std cat-os

Reads an environment variable via std::env::var⮳.

use std::env;
use std::fs;
use std::io::Error;

fn main() -> Result<(), Error> {
    // read `config_path` from the environment variable `CONFIG`.
    // If `CONFIG` isn't set, fall back to a default config path.
    let config_path =
        env::var("CONFIG").unwrap_or("/etc/subversion/config".to_string());

    let config: String = fs::read_to_string(config_path)?;
    println!("Config: {}", config);

    Ok(())
}

Run child processes using duct

duct duct-crates.io duct-github duct-lib.rs

duct.rs⮳ is a library for running child processes. Duct makes it easy to build pipelines and redirect IO like a shell. At the same time, Duct helps you write correct, portable code: whitespace is never significant, errors from child processes get reported by default, and a variety of gotchas, bugs, and platform inconsistencies⮳ are handled for you.