Develop Reference

how to get Powershell output of this code? [duplicate]

I would like to run an external command line program from my Mono/.NET app.
For example, I would like to run mencoder. Is it possible:
To get the command line shell output, and write it on my text box?
To get the numerical value to show a progress bar with time elapsed?

When you create your Process object set StartInfo appropriately:
var proc = new Process
{
StartInfo = new ProcessStartInfo
{
FileName = "program.exe",
Arguments = "command line arguments to your executable",
UseShellExecute = false,
RedirectStandardOutput = true,
CreateNoWindow = true
}
};
then start the process and read from it:
proc.Start();
while (!proc.StandardOutput.EndOfStream)
{
string line = proc.StandardOutput.ReadLine();
// do something with line
}
You can use int.Parse() or int.TryParse() to convert the strings to numeric values. You may have to do some string manipulation first if there are invalid numeric characters in the strings you read.

You can process your output synchronously or asynchronously.
1. Synchronous example
static void runCommand()
{
Process process = new Process();
process.StartInfo.FileName = "cmd.exe";
process.StartInfo.Arguments = "/c DIR"; // Note the /c command (*)
process.StartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
process.StartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
process.StartInfo.RedirectStandardError = true;
process.Start();
//* Read the output (or the error)
string output = process.StandardOutput.ReadToEnd();
Console.WriteLine(output);
string err = process.StandardError.ReadToEnd();
Console.WriteLine(err);
process.WaitForExit();
}
Note that it's better to process both output and errors: they must be handled separately.
(*) For some commands (here StartInfo.Arguments) you must add the /c directive, otherwise the process freezes in the WaitForExit().
2. Asynchronous example
static void runCommand()
{
//* Create your Process
Process process = new Process();
process.StartInfo.FileName = "cmd.exe";
process.StartInfo.Arguments = "/c DIR";
process.StartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
process.StartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
process.StartInfo.RedirectStandardError = true;
//* Set your output and error (asynchronous) handlers
process.OutputDataReceived += new DataReceivedEventHandler(OutputHandler);
process.ErrorDataReceived += new DataReceivedEventHandler(OutputHandler);
//* Start process and handlers
process.Start();
process.BeginOutputReadLine();
process.BeginErrorReadLine();
process.WaitForExit();
}
static void OutputHandler(object sendingProcess, DataReceivedEventArgs outLine)
{
//* Do your stuff with the output (write to console/log/StringBuilder)
Console.WriteLine(outLine.Data);
}
If you don't need to do complicate operations with the output, you can bypass the OutputHandler method, just adding the handlers directly inline:
//* Set your output and error (asynchronous) handlers
process.OutputDataReceived += (s, e) => Console.WriteLine(e.Data);
process.ErrorDataReceived += (s, e) => Console.WriteLine(e.Data);

Alright, for anyone who wants both Errors and Outputs read, but gets deadlocks with any of the solutions, provided in other answers (like me), here is a solution that I built after reading MSDN explanation for StandardOutput property.
Answer is based on T30's code:
static void runCommand()
{
//* Create your Process
Process process = new Process();
process.StartInfo.FileName = "cmd.exe";
process.StartInfo.Arguments = "/c DIR";
process.StartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
process.StartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
process.StartInfo.RedirectStandardError = true;
//* Set ONLY ONE handler here.
process.ErrorDataReceived += new DataReceivedEventHandler(ErrorOutputHandler);
//* Start process
process.Start();
//* Read one element asynchronously
process.BeginErrorReadLine();
//* Read the other one synchronously
string output = process.StandardOutput.ReadToEnd();
Console.WriteLine(output);
process.WaitForExit();
}
static void ErrorOutputHandler(object sendingProcess, DataReceivedEventArgs outLine)
{
//* Do your stuff with the output (write to console/log/StringBuilder)
Console.WriteLine(outLine.Data);
}

The standard .NET way of doing this is to read from the Process' StandardOutput stream. There is an example in the linked MSDN docs. Similar, you can read from StandardError, and write to StandardInput.

It is possible to get the command line shell output of a process as described here : http://www.c-sharpcorner.com/UploadFile/edwinlima/SystemDiagnosticProcess12052005035444AM/SystemDiagnosticProcess.aspx
This depends on mencoder. If it ouputs this status on the command line then yes :)

you can use shared memory for the 2 processes to communicate through, check out MemoryMappedFile
you'll mainly create a memory mapped file mmf in the parent process using "using" statement then create the second process till it terminates and let it write the result to the mmf using BinaryWriter, then read the result from the mmf using the parent process, you can also pass the mmf name using command line arguments or hard code it.
make sure when using the mapped file in the parent process that you make the child process write the result to the mapped file before the mapped file is released in the parent process
Example:
parent process
private static void Main(string[] args)
{
using (MemoryMappedFile mmf = MemoryMappedFile.CreateNew("memfile", 128))
{
using (MemoryMappedViewStream stream = mmf.CreateViewStream())
{
BinaryWriter writer = new BinaryWriter(stream);
writer.Write(512);
}
Console.WriteLine("Starting the child process");
// Command line args are separated by a space
Process p = Process.Start("ChildProcess.exe", "memfile");
Console.WriteLine("Waiting child to die");
p.WaitForExit();
Console.WriteLine("Child died");
using (MemoryMappedViewStream stream = mmf.CreateViewStream())
{
BinaryReader reader = new BinaryReader(stream);
Console.WriteLine("Result:" + reader.ReadInt32());
}
}
Console.WriteLine("Press any key to continue...");
Console.ReadKey();
}
Child process
private static void Main(string[] args)
{
Console.WriteLine("Child process started");
string mmfName = args[0];
using (MemoryMappedFile mmf = MemoryMappedFile.OpenExisting(mmfName))
{
int readValue;
using (MemoryMappedViewStream stream = mmf.CreateViewStream())
{
BinaryReader reader = new BinaryReader(stream);
Console.WriteLine("child reading: " + (readValue = reader.ReadInt32()));
}
using (MemoryMappedViewStream input = mmf.CreateViewStream())
{
BinaryWriter writer = new BinaryWriter(input);
writer.Write(readValue * 2);
}
}
Console.WriteLine("Press any key to continue...");
Console.ReadKey();
}
to use this sample, you'll need to create a solution with 2 projects inside, then you take the build result of the child process from %childDir%/bin/debug and copy it to %parentDirectory%/bin/debug then run the parent project
childDir and parentDirectory are the folder names of your projects on the pc
good luck :)

You can log process output using below code:
ProcessStartInfo pinfo = new ProcessStartInfo(item);
pinfo.CreateNoWindow = false;
pinfo.UseShellExecute = true;
pinfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
pinfo.RedirectStandardInput = true;
pinfo.RedirectStandardError = true;
pinfo.WindowStyle = System.Diagnostics.ProcessWindowStyle.Normal;
var p = Process.Start(pinfo);
p.WaitForExit();
Process process = Process.Start(new ProcessStartInfo((item + '>' + item + ".txt"))
{
UseShellExecute = false,
RedirectStandardOutput = true
});
process.WaitForExit();
string output = process.StandardOutput.ReadToEnd();
if (process.ExitCode != 0) {
}

How to launch a process (such as a bat file, perl script, console program) and have its standard output displayed on a windows form:
processCaller = new ProcessCaller(this);
//processCaller.FileName = #"..\..\hello.bat";
processCaller.FileName = #"commandline.exe";
processCaller.Arguments = "";
processCaller.StdErrReceived += new DataReceivedHandler(writeStreamInfo);
processCaller.StdOutReceived += new DataReceivedHandler(writeStreamInfo);
processCaller.Completed += new EventHandler(processCompletedOrCanceled);
processCaller.Cancelled += new EventHandler(processCompletedOrCanceled);
// processCaller.Failed += no event handler for this one, yet.
this.richTextBox1.Text = "Started function. Please stand by.." + Environment.NewLine;
// the following function starts a process and returns immediately,
// thus allowing the form to stay responsive.
processCaller.Start();
You can find ProcessCaller on this link: Launching a process and displaying its standard output

I was running into the infamous deadlock problem when calling Process.StandardOutput.ReadLine and Process.StandardOutput.ReadToEnd.
My goal/use case is simple. Start a process and redirect it's output so I can capture that output and log it to the console via .NET Core's ILogger<T> and also append the redirected output to a file log.
Here's my solution using the built in async event handlers Process.OutputDataReceived and Process.ErrorDataReceived.
var p = new Process
{
StartInfo = new ProcessStartInfo(
command.FileName, command.Arguments
)
{
RedirectStandardOutput = true,
RedirectStandardError = true,
UseShellExecute = false,
}
};
// Asynchronously pushes StdOut and StdErr lines to a thread safe FIFO queue
var logQueue = new ConcurrentQueue<string>();
p.OutputDataReceived += (sender, args) => logQueue.Enqueue(args.Data);
p.ErrorDataReceived += (sender, args) => logQueue.Enqueue(args.Data);
// Start the process and begin streaming StdOut/StdErr
p.Start();
p.BeginOutputReadLine();
p.BeginErrorReadLine();
// Loop until the process has exited or the CancellationToken is triggered
do
{
var lines = new List<string>();
while (logQueue.TryDequeue(out var log))
{
lines.Add(log);
_logger.LogInformation(log)
}
File.AppendAllLines(_logFilePath, lines);
// Asynchronously sleep for some time
try
{
Task.Delay(5000, stoppingToken).Wait(stoppingToken);
}
catch(OperationCanceledException) {}
} while (!p.HasExited && !stoppingToken.IsCancellationRequested);

The solution that worked for me in win and linux is the folling
// GET api/values
[HttpGet("cifrado/{xml}")]
public ActionResult<IEnumerable<string>> Cifrado(String xml)
{
String nombreXML = DateTime.Now.ToString("ddMMyyyyhhmmss").ToString();
String archivo = "/app/files/"+nombreXML + ".XML";
String comando = " --armor --recipient bibankingprd#bi.com.gt --encrypt " + archivo;
try{
System.IO.File.WriteAllText(archivo, xml);
//String comando = "C:\\GnuPG\\bin\\gpg.exe --recipient licorera#local.com --armor --encrypt C:\\Users\\Administrador\\Documents\\pruebas\\nuevo.xml ";
ProcessStartInfo startInfo = new ProcessStartInfo() {FileName = "/usr/bin/gpg", Arguments = comando };
Process proc = new Process() { StartInfo = startInfo, };
proc.StartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
proc.StartInfo.RedirectStandardError = true;
proc.Start();
proc.WaitForExit();
Console.WriteLine(proc.StandardOutput.ReadToEnd());
return new string[] { "Archivo encriptado", archivo + " - "+ comando};
}catch (Exception exception){
return new string[] { archivo, "exception: "+exception.ToString() + " - "+ comando };
}
}

System.Diagnostics.Process is not the most pleasant to work with, so you may want to try CliWrap. It offers many different models for working with output, including piping, buffering, and real-time streaming. Here are some examples (taken from readme).
Simply launch a command line executable:
using CliWrap;
var result = await Cli.Wrap("path/to/exe")
.WithArguments("--foo bar")
.WithWorkingDirectory("work/dir/path")
.ExecuteAsync();
// Result contains:
// -- result.ExitCode (int)
// -- result.StartTime (DateTimeOffset)
// -- result.ExitTime (DateTimeOffset)
// -- result.RunTime (TimeSpan)
Launch a command line executable and buffer stdout/stderr in-memory:
using CliWrap;
using CliWrap.Buffered;
// Calling `ExecuteBufferedAsync()` instead of `ExecuteAsync()`
// implicitly configures pipes that write to in-memory buffers.
var result = await Cli.Wrap("path/to/exe")
.WithArguments("--foo bar")
.WithWorkingDirectory("work/dir/path")
.ExecuteBufferedAsync();
// Result contains:
// -- result.StandardOutput (string)
// -- result.StandardError (string)
// -- result.ExitCode (int)
// -- result.StartTime (DateTimeOffset)
// -- result.ExitTime (DateTimeOffset)
// -- result.RunTime (TimeSpan)
Launch a command line executable with manual pipe configuration:
using CliWrap
var buffer = new StringBuilder();
var result = await Cli.Wrap("foo")
.WithStandardOutputPipe(PipeTarget.ToFile("output.txt"))
.WithStandardErrorPipe(PipeTarget.ToStringBuilder(buffer))
.ExecuteAsync();
Launch a command line executable as an event stream:
using CliWrap;
using CliWrap.EventStream;
var cmd = Cli.Wrap("foo").WithArguments("bar");
await foreach (var cmdEvent in cmd.ListenAsync())
{
switch (cmdEvent)
{
case StartedCommandEvent started:
_output.WriteLine($"Process started; ID: {started.ProcessId}");
break;
case StandardOutputCommandEvent stdOut:
_output.WriteLine($"Out> {stdOut.Text}");
break;
case StandardErrorCommandEvent stdErr:
_output.WriteLine($"Err> {stdErr.Text}");
break;
case ExitedCommandEvent exited:
_output.WriteLine($"Process exited; Code: {exited.ExitCode}");
break;
}
}

C# Redirect other console app StandardOutput fail if I won't close StardandInput

I've got a tricky issue with a console app, from which I'm trying to redirect StandardInput, StandardOutput and StandardError.
I've got a working solution for other console app - that's not a new thing for me. But this app seems to have something special, which is making impossible to redirect all outputs with a standard approach.
Console app works like this:
directly after startup writes a few lines and waits for user input
no matter what input is - console app is showing some output and again wait for new input
console app never ends, it has to be closed
I've tried already solutions based on:
StandardOutput/Error.ReadToEnd()
taki care of OutputDataReceived & ErrorDataReceived with read line by line with ReadLine
reading by char
waiting for the end of process (which is not ending, so I'm running into a deadlock)
to start console app in a preloaded cmd.exe and grab this (StandardOutput stopped to show just after launch of this console app)
to manually flush input
All the time I had completely no output and no error stream from console app - nothing.
After a multitude attempts I've discovered, that I can receive StandardOutput only when I'll close StandardInput after programatically inputting the data.
But in this case, console app is going wild, falling into loop of writing few lines to StandardOutput as on start-up, which makes final output big and full of garbages.
With MedallionShell library I'm able to try to gracefully kill it with Ctrl+C, but this solution is still far from acceptable, because:
sometimes console app will produce so much garbages before I will be able to kill it, that it crashes my app
even if this won't crash, searching for expected output in a lot of garbages is nasty and tragically slows down automatization (6000 records in... 15 minutes)
I'm unable to provide more than one input at a time, so I have to start console app just to receive one output, close and start again for another output
I've got no sources for that console app, so I'm even not able to recreate the issue or fix it - it's some very legacy app at my company, which I'm trying to make at least a bit automatic...
Code, with which I've got at least anything now (with MediallionShell):
var command = Command.Run(Environment.CurrentDirectory + #"\console_app.exe");
command.StandardInput.WriteLine("expected_input");
command.StandardInput.Close(); // without that I'll never receive any output or error stream from this stubborn console app
command.TrySignalAsync(CommandSignal.ControlC); // attempt to kill gracefully, not always successfull...
var result = command.Result;
textBox1.AppendText(String.Join(Environment.NewLine, command.GetOutputAndErrorLines().ToArray().Take(10))); // trying to get rid of garbages
command.Kill(); // additional kill attempt if Ctrl+C didn't help, sometimes even this fails
Any help will be appreciated, I'm also still searching for solution and now I'm checking this one: PostMessage not working with console window whose output is redirected and read asynchronously but author there had an output and I don't...

You haven't provided a sample Console program to test with, but something like the following may work:
Create a Console project (Console (.NET Framework)) - used for testing
using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Text;
using System.Threading.Tasks;
namespace ConsoleTestApp
{
class Program
{
static void Main(string[] args)
{
//prompt for input - 1st prompt
Console.Write("Please enter filename: ");
string filename = Console.ReadLine();
if (System.IO.File.Exists(filename))
{
Console.WriteLine("'" + filename + "' exists.");
}
else
{
Console.Error.WriteLine("'" + filename + "' doesn't exist.");
}
//prompt for input - 2nd prompt
Console.Write("Would you like to exit? ");
string answer = Console.ReadLine();
Console.WriteLine("Your answer was: " + answer);
Console.WriteLine("Operation complete.");
}
}
}
Then, create a Windows Forms project Windows Forms (.NET Framework) and run one of the following:
Option 1:
private void RunCmd(string exePath, string arguments = null)
{
//create new instance
ProcessStartInfo startInfo = new ProcessStartInfo(exePath, arguments);
startInfo.Arguments = arguments; //arguments
startInfo.CreateNoWindow = true; //don't create a window
startInfo.RedirectStandardError = true; //redirect standard error
startInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true; //redirect standard output
startInfo.RedirectStandardInput = true;
startInfo.UseShellExecute = false; //if true, uses 'ShellExecute'; if false, uses 'CreateProcess'
startInfo.WindowStyle = ProcessWindowStyle.Hidden;
startInfo.ErrorDialog = false;
//create new instance
using (Process p = new Process { StartInfo = startInfo, EnableRaisingEvents = true })
{
//subscribe to event and add event handler code
p.ErrorDataReceived += (sender, e) =>
{
if (!String.IsNullOrEmpty(e.Data))
{
//ToDo: add desired code
Debug.WriteLine("Error: " + e.Data);
}
};
//subscribe to event and add event handler code
p.OutputDataReceived += (sender, e) =>
{
if (!String.IsNullOrEmpty(e.Data))
{
//ToDo: add desired code
Debug.WriteLine("Output: " + e.Data);
}
};
p.Start(); //start
p.BeginErrorReadLine(); //begin async reading for standard error
p.BeginOutputReadLine(); //begin async reading for standard output
using (StreamWriter sw = p.StandardInput)
{
//provide values for each input prompt
//ToDo: add values for each input prompt - changing the for loop as necessary
for (int i = 0; i < 2; i++)
{
if (i == 0)
sw.WriteLine(#"C:\Temp\Test1.txt"); //1st prompt
else if (i == 1)
sw.WriteLine("Yes"); //2nd prompt
else
break; //exit
}
}
//waits until the process is finished before continuing
p.WaitForExit();
}
}
Option 2:
private void RunCmd(string exePath, string arguments = null)
{
//create new instance
ProcessStartInfo startInfo = new ProcessStartInfo(exePath, arguments);
startInfo.Arguments = arguments; //arguments
startInfo.CreateNoWindow = true; //don't create a window
startInfo.RedirectStandardError = true; //redirect standard error
startInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true; //redirect standard output
startInfo.RedirectStandardInput = true;
startInfo.UseShellExecute = false; //if true, uses 'ShellExecute'; if false, uses 'CreateProcess'
startInfo.WindowStyle = ProcessWindowStyle.Hidden;
startInfo.ErrorDialog = false;
//create new instance
using (Process p = new Process { StartInfo = startInfo, EnableRaisingEvents = true })
{
//subscribe to event and add event handler code
p.ErrorDataReceived += (sender, e) =>
{
if (!String.IsNullOrEmpty(e.Data))
{
//ToDo: add desired code
Debug.WriteLine("Error: " + e.Data);
}
};
//subscribe to event and add event handler code
p.OutputDataReceived += (sender, e) =>
{
if (!String.IsNullOrEmpty(e.Data))
{
//ToDo: add desired code
Debug.WriteLine("Output: " + e.Data);
}
};
p.Start(); //start
p.BeginErrorReadLine(); //begin async reading for standard error
p.BeginOutputReadLine(); //begin async reading for standard output
using (StreamWriter sw = p.StandardInput)
{
//provide values for each input prompt
//ToDo: add values for each input prompt - changing the for loop as necessary
sw.WriteLine(#"C:\Temp\Test1.txt"); //1st prompt
sw.WriteLine("Yes"); //2nd prompt
}
//waits until the process is finished before continuing
p.WaitForExit();
}
}
Option 3:
Note: This one is modified from here.
private void RunCmd(string exePath, string arguments = null)
{
//create new instance
ProcessStartInfo startInfo = new ProcessStartInfo(exePath, arguments);
startInfo.Arguments = arguments; //arguments
startInfo.CreateNoWindow = true; //don't create a window
startInfo.RedirectStandardError = true; //redirect standard error
startInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true; //redirect standard output
startInfo.RedirectStandardInput = true;
startInfo.UseShellExecute = false; //if true, uses 'ShellExecute'; if false, uses 'CreateProcess'
startInfo.WindowStyle = ProcessWindowStyle.Hidden;
startInfo.ErrorDialog = false;
//create new instance
using (Process p = new Process { StartInfo = startInfo, EnableRaisingEvents = true })
{
p.Start(); //start
Read(p.StandardOutput);
Read(p.StandardError);
using (StreamWriter sw = p.StandardInput)
{
//provide values for each input prompt
//ToDo: add values for each input prompt - changing the for loop as necessary
sw.WriteLine(#"C:\Temp\Test1.txt"); //1st prompt
sw.WriteLine("Yes"); //2nd prompt
}
//waits until the process is finished before continuing
p.WaitForExit();
}
}
private static void Read(StreamReader reader)
{
new System.Threading.Thread(() =>
{
while (true)
{
int current;
while ((current = reader.Read()) >= 0)
Console.Write((char)current);
}
}).Start();
}

Executing batch file times out on certain commands

I'm executing a batch file with the following code:
using (var process = new Process())
{
process.StartInfo.CreateNoWindow = true;
process.StartInfo.FileName = "cmd.exe";
process.StartInfo.Arguments = "/c \"\"" + batchFile + "\"\"";
process.StartInfo.WorkingDirectory = AppDomain.CurrentDomain.BaseDirectory;
process.StartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
process.StartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
process.StartInfo.RedirectStandardError = true;
var output = new StringBuilder();
var error = new StringBuilder();
using (var outputWaitHandle = new AutoResetEvent(false))
using (var errorWaitHandle = new AutoResetEvent(false))
{
process.OutputDataReceived += (sender, e) =>
{
if (e.Data == null)
{
outputWaitHandle.Set();
}
else
{
output.AppendLine(e.Data);
}
};
process.ErrorDataReceived += (sender, e) =>
{
if (e.Data == null)
{
errorWaitHandle.Set();
}
else
{
error.AppendLine(e.Data);
}
};
process.Start();
process.BeginOutputReadLine();
process.BeginErrorReadLine();
if (process.WaitForExit(30000) &&
outputWaitHandle.WaitOne(30000) &&
errorWaitHandle.WaitOne(30000))
{
Log("Batch file exit code: " + process.ExitCode + ".\nOutput: " + output + ".\nError ouput: " + error);
}
else
{
Log("The batch file timed out.");
}
}
}
This code executes a batch file, and waits for it to complete. And it works fine when my batch file only outputs to a text file. But if my batch file contains the line start "C:\Windows\System32" notepad.exe, it times out. Why?
EDIT
I just realized that it hangs even if all I have in my batch file is notepad.exe, but it works fine if I'm writing to a text file. The exit code is InvalidOperation
EDIT
Even with this simple code, it won't open notepad. It doesn't throw any exception or anything either...
string notepadPath = Path.Combine(Environment.SystemDirectory, "notepad.exe");
if (System.IO.File.Exists(notepadPath))
Process.Start(notepadPath);

Check the Task Manager stats tab - I'm sure there are a lot of notepads there.
You are creating the Process with StartInfo.CreateNoWindow = true;. This prevents the notepad window to open, as no window - no notepad. Also the same behaviour is for UseShellExecute = false;.
Remove these lines and try out another time (and make sure if there is a notepadPath file exists, and the batch, if you run it manually, opens the notepad).
According the MSDN:
// This code assumes the process you are starting will terminate itself.
// Given that is is started without a window so you cannot terminate it
// on the desktop, it must terminate itself or you can do it programmatically
// from this application using the Kill method.
So you simply creating your process and batch is waiting for it to close, which won't never happen.

How can I feed commands to cmd.exe process via an input stream manually?

The question sounds a bit, dense. Here is a slightly longer version:
I need to have the main loop wait for user input and also have a process running and waiting for input from a stream to which the user input is to be sent.
Full story: I'm building a Cmd emulator and at first everything looked fine: The user enters a command, it gets echoed to the output area, processed and StdOut and StdErrOut are captured and also added to the output TextBox.
The only problem was, that, as the cmd process was created and started separately for each command, no state was kept. Neither variables nor codepage nor working directory etc..
So I decided to invent a little hack: Entering an opening or closing parenthesis starts and stops collecting the commands instead of executing them. After the closing parenthesis the list of commands ('batch') is used in the processBatch method to feed them all to the cmd process vie its redirected input. Worked fine.
The only problem was, obviously, now I got state but lost immediate response, so any errors wouldn't pop up until the batch was run.
So I decided to combine the good parts and, well, I knew I was heading for trouble when I realized, that to keep two loops working & waiting I have to use threading. Which I haven't done in years..
In the layout I chose the main() loop waits for user input and startCMDtask() runs startCMD() in a task. Here the input stream is scanned until is has data and then the cmd process is to process them..
But it doesn't work.
List<string> batch = new List<string>();
public volatile string output = "+";
public volatile string outputErr = "-";
Process CMD;
Task cmdTask;
volatile Queue<string> cmdQueue = new Queue<string>();
volatile public bool CMDrunning = false;
Tthis works just fine
private void processBatch()
{
Process p = new Process();
ProcessStartInfo info = new ProcessStartInfo();
info.FileName = "cmd.exe";
info.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
info.RedirectStandardError = true;
info.RedirectStandardInput = true;
info.UseShellExecute = false;
p.StartInfo = info;
p.Start();
using (StreamWriter sw = p.StandardInput)
{
if (sw.BaseStream.CanWrite)
foreach(string line in batch) sw.WriteLine(line);
}
output = "^"; outputErr = "~";
try { output = p.StandardOutput.ReadToEnd(); } catch { }
try { outputErr = p.StandardError.ReadToEnd(); } catch { }
try { p.WaitForExit(); } catch { }
tb_output.AppendText(output + "\r\n" + outputErr + "\r\n");
}
These don't quite, but almost..
private void setupCMD()
{
CMD = new Process();
ProcessStartInfo info = new ProcessStartInfo();
info.FileName = "cmd.exe";
// info.Arguments = "/K"; // doesn't make a difference
info.CreateNoWindow = true;
info.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
info.RedirectStandardError = true;
info.RedirectStandardInput = true;
info.UseShellExecute = false;
CMD.StartInfo = info;
}
private void startCMDtask()
{
var task = Task.Factory.StartNew(() => startCMD());
cmdTask = task;
}
private void startCMD()
{
try { CMD.Start(); CMDrunning = true; }
catch { output = "Error starting cmd process.\r\n"; CMDrunning = false; }
using (StreamWriter sw = CMD.StandardInput)
{
if (sw.BaseStream.CanWrite)
do {
try
{
string cmd = cmdQueue.Dequeue();
if (cmd != null & cmd !="")
{
sw.WriteLine(cmd);
processOutputStreams();
}
}
catch {}
} while (CMDrunning);
}
private void processOutputStreams()
{
string newOutput = ""; string newOutputErr = "";
while (CMD.StandardOutput.Peek() > 0)
newOutput += (char)(CMD.StandardOutput.Read());
newOutput += "!?"; // at this point stdout is correctly captured (1)
try {
while (CMD.StandardError.Peek() > 0) // from here execution jumps away (2)
{ newOutputErr += (char)(CMD.StandardError.Read()); }
} catch {
newOutputErr = "?"; // never comes here
}
lock (output) // no noticable difference
lock (outputErr) //
{ // if I jump here (3) from (1) the result is displayed
// but not if i comment out the 2nd while loop (2)
if (newOutput != null & newOutput != "") output += newOutput + "\r\n";
if (newOutputErr != null & newOutputErr != "") outputErr += newOutputErr + "\r\n";
}
}
This is the call from the input processor in the main thread:
lock (cmdQueue) cmdQueue.Enqueue(cmd);
I have no idea which part is the problem: the process, the cmd shell, the input stream, the output stream, the threading, the locks or all of it in turns..??

I finally got it working. The reason for the erratic behaviour I described in the code samples was that the 3 streams were not accessed in an async'ed manner.
To rectify I discarded the processOutput function and replaced it by two calls that the process itself triggers. MS documetation gives a fine example here
I also made the StreamWriter sync, that feeds the process and the whole task it runs in as well.
Here is the new code:
private void startCMDtask()
{
var task = Task.Factory.StartNew(() => startCMD());
cmdTask = task;
}
private async void startCMD()
{
try { CMD.Start(); CMDrunning = true; }
catch { cmdErrOutput.Append("\r\nError starting cmd process.");
CMDrunning = false; }
CMD.BeginOutputReadLine();
CMD.BeginErrorReadLine();
using (StreamWriter sw = CMD.StandardInput)
{
if (sw.BaseStream.CanWrite)
do {
try
{
string cmd = cmdQueue.Dequeue();
if (cmd != null & cmd !="") await sw.WriteLineAsync(cmd);
}
catch { }
} while (CMDrunning);
try { CMD.WaitForExit(); }
catch { cmdErrOutput.Append("WaitForExit Error.\r\n"); }
}
}
This is how the process is set up now:
private void setupCMD()
{
CMD = new Process();
ProcessStartInfo info = new ProcessStartInfo();
info.FileName = "cmd.exe";
info.CreateNoWindow = true;
info.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
info.RedirectStandardError = true;
info.RedirectStandardInput = true;
info.UseShellExecute = false;
CMD.OutputDataReceived += new DataReceivedEventHandler(cmdOutputDataHandler);
CMD.ErrorDataReceived += new DataReceivedEventHandler(cmdErrorDataHandler);
cmdOutput = new StringBuilder();
cmdErrOutput = new StringBuilder();
CMD.StartInfo = info;
}
And here are the output handlers:
private static void cmdOutputDataHandler(object sendingProcess, DataReceivedEventArgs outLine)
{
if (!String.IsNullOrEmpty(outLine.Data))
{ // Add the text to the collected output.
cmdOutput.Append(Environment.NewLine + outLine.Data);
}
}
private static void cmdErrorDataHandler(object sendingProcess, DataReceivedEventArgs outLine)
{
if (!String.IsNullOrEmpty(outLine.Data))
{ // Add the text to the collected error output.
cmdErrOutput.Append(Environment.NewLine + outLine.Data);
}
}
At the end of the user input porcessing this is how the input queue is ged and the output fetched:
cmdUnDoStack.Push(cmd);
Application.DoEvents();
TaskScheduler uiScheduler = TaskScheduler.FromCurrentSynchronizationContext();
Task.Factory.StartNew(() => updateOutputArea(uiScheduler));
Using this little routine:
private void updateOutputArea(TaskScheduler uiScheduler)
{
Task.Factory.StartNew(() =>
{
tb_output.AppendText(cmdOutput + "\r\n" + cmdErrOutput + "\r\n");
cmdOutput.Clear();
cmdErrOutput.Clear();
}, System.Threading.CancellationToken.None, TaskCreationOptions.None, uiScheduler);
}
And now for the special treament some of the good old commands like CLS or COLOR need.. ;-)

Capturing console output from a .NET application (C#)

How do I invoke a console application from my .NET application and capture all the output generated in the console?
(Remember, I don't want to save the information first in a file and then relist as I would love to receive it as live.)

This can be quite easily achieved using the ProcessStartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput property. A full sample is contained in the linked MSDN documentation; the only caveat is that you may have to redirect the standard error stream as well to see all output of your application.
Process compiler = new Process();
compiler.StartInfo.FileName = "csc.exe";
compiler.StartInfo.Arguments = "/r:System.dll /out:sample.exe stdstr.cs";
compiler.StartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
compiler.StartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
compiler.Start();
Console.WriteLine(compiler.StandardOutput.ReadToEnd());
compiler.WaitForExit();

This is bit improvement over accepted answer from #mdb. Specifically, we also capture error output of the process. Additionally, we capture these outputs through events because ReadToEnd() doesn't work if you want to capture both error and regular output. It took me while to make this work because it actually also requires BeginxxxReadLine() calls after Start().
Asynchronous way:
using System.Diagnostics;
Process process = new Process();
void LaunchProcess()
{
process.EnableRaisingEvents = true;
process.OutputDataReceived += new System.Diagnostics.DataReceivedEventHandler(process_OutputDataReceived);
process.ErrorDataReceived += new System.Diagnostics.DataReceivedEventHandler(process_ErrorDataReceived);
process.Exited += new System.EventHandler(process_Exited);
process.StartInfo.FileName = "some.exe";
process.StartInfo.Arguments = "param1 param2";
process.StartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
process.StartInfo.RedirectStandardError = true;
process.StartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
process.Start();
process.BeginErrorReadLine();
process.BeginOutputReadLine();
//below line is optional if we want a blocking call
//process.WaitForExit();
}
void process_Exited(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
Console.WriteLine(string.Format("process exited with code {0}\n", process.ExitCode.ToString()));
}
void process_ErrorDataReceived(object sender, DataReceivedEventArgs e)
{
Console.WriteLine(e.Data + "\n");
}
void process_OutputDataReceived(object sender, DataReceivedEventArgs e)
{
Console.WriteLine(e.Data + "\n");
}

Use ProcessStartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput to redirect the output when creating your console process.
Then you can use Process.StandardOutput to read the program output.
The second link has a sample code how to do it.

ConsoleAppLauncher is an open source library made specifically to answer that question. It captures all the output generated in the console and provides simple interface to start and close console application.
The ConsoleOutput event is fired every time when a new line is written by the console to standard/error output. The lines are queued and guaranteed to follow the output order.
Also available as NuGet package.
Sample call to get full console output:
// Run simplest shell command and return its output.
public static string GetWindowsVersion()
{
return ConsoleApp.Run("cmd", "/c ver").Output.Trim();
}
Sample with live feedback:
// Run ping.exe asynchronously and return roundtrip times back to the caller in a callback
public static void PingUrl(string url, Action<string> replyHandler)
{
var regex = new Regex("(time=|Average = )(?<time>.*?ms)", RegexOptions.Compiled);
var app = new ConsoleApp("ping", url);
app.ConsoleOutput += (o, args) =>
{
var match = regex.Match(args.Line);
if (match.Success)
{
var roundtripTime = match.Groups["time"].Value;
replyHandler(roundtripTime);
}
};
app.Run();
}

I've added a number of helper methods to the O2 Platform (Open Source project) which allow you easily script an interaction with another process via the console output and input (see http://code.google.com/p/o2platform/source/browse/trunk/O2_Scripts/APIs/Windows/CmdExe/CmdExeAPI.cs)
Also useful for you might be the API that allows the viewing of the console output of the current process (in an existing control or popup window). See this blog post for more details: http://o2platform.wordpress.com/2011/11/26/api_consoleout-cs-inprocess-capture-of-the-console-output/ (this blog also contains details of how to consume the console output of new processes)

I made a reactive version that accepts callbacks for stdOut and StdErr.
onStdOut and onStdErr are called asynchronously,
as soon as data arrives (before the process exits).
public static Int32 RunProcess(String path,
String args,
Action<String> onStdOut = null,
Action<String> onStdErr = null)
{
var readStdOut = onStdOut != null;
var readStdErr = onStdErr != null;
var process = new Process
{
StartInfo =
{
FileName = path,
Arguments = args,
CreateNoWindow = true,
UseShellExecute = false,
RedirectStandardOutput = readStdOut,
RedirectStandardError = readStdErr,
}
};
process.Start();
if (readStdOut) Task.Run(() => ReadStream(process.StandardOutput, onStdOut));
if (readStdErr) Task.Run(() => ReadStream(process.StandardError, onStdErr));
process.WaitForExit();
return process.ExitCode;
}
private static void ReadStream(TextReader textReader, Action<String> callback)
{
while (true)
{
var line = textReader.ReadLine();
if (line == null)
break;
callback(line);
}
}
Example usage
The following will run executable with args and print
stdOut in white
stdErr in red
to the console.
RunProcess(
executable,
args,
s => { Console.ForegroundColor = ConsoleColor.White; Console.WriteLine(s); },
s => { Console.ForegroundColor = ConsoleColor.Red; Console.WriteLine(s); }
);

From PythonTR - Python Programcıları Derneği, e-kitap, örnek:
Process p = new Process(); // Create new object
p.StartInfo.UseShellExecute = false; // Do not use shell
p.StartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true; // Redirect output
p.StartInfo.FileName = "c:\\python26\\python.exe"; // Path of our Python compiler
p.StartInfo.Arguments = "c:\\python26\\Hello_C_Python.py"; // Path of the .py to be executed

Added process.StartInfo.**CreateNoWindow** = true; and timeout.
private static void CaptureConsoleAppOutput(string exeName, string arguments, int timeoutMilliseconds, out int exitCode, out string output)
{
using (Process process = new Process())
{
process.StartInfo.FileName = exeName;
process.StartInfo.Arguments = arguments;
process.StartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
process.StartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;
process.StartInfo.CreateNoWindow = true;
process.Start();
output = process.StandardOutput.ReadToEnd();
bool exited = process.WaitForExit(timeoutMilliseconds);
if (exited)
{
exitCode = process.ExitCode;
}
else
{
exitCode = -1;
}
}
}