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- __builtin__.object
-
- spawn
- exceptions.Exception
-
- ExceptionPexpect
-
- EOF
- TIMEOUT
class spawn(__builtin__.object) |
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This is the main class interface for Pexpect.
Use this class to start and control child applications.
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Methods defined here:
- __del__(self)
- This makes sure that no system resources are left open.
Python only garbage collects Python objects. OS file descriptors
are not Python objects, so they must be handled explicitly.
If the child file descriptor was opened outside of this class
(passed to the constructor) then this does not close it.
- __init__(self, command, args=[], timeout=30, maxread=2000, searchwindowsize=None, logfile=None, env=None)
- This is the constructor. The command parameter may be a string
that includes a command and any arguments to the command. For example:
p = pexpect.spawn ('/usr/bin/ftp')
p = pexpect.spawn ('/usr/bin/ssh user@example.com')
p = pexpect.spawn ('ls -latr /tmp')
You may also construct it with a list of arguments like so:
p = pexpect.spawn ('/usr/bin/ftp', [])
p = pexpect.spawn ('/usr/bin/ssh', ['user@example.com'])
p = pexpect.spawn ('ls', ['-latr', '/tmp'])
After this the child application will be created and
will be ready to talk to. For normal use, see expect() and
send() and sendline().
The maxread attribute sets the read buffer size.
This is maximum number of bytes that Pexpect will try to read from a TTY at one time.
The default buffer size is 1 (unbuffered). Setting this value higher
will help performance in cases where large amounts of output are read back from the child.
This feature is useful in conjunction with searchwindowsize.
The searchwindowsize attribute sets the how far back in
the incomming seach buffer Pexpect will search for pattern matches.
Every time Pexpect reads some data from the child it will append the data to
the incomming buffer. The default is to search from the beginning of the
imcomming buffer each time new data is read from the child.
But this is very inefficient if you are running a command that
generates a large amount of data where you want to match
The searchwindowsize does not effect the size of the incomming data buffer.
You will still have access to the full buffer after expect() returns.
The logfile member turns on or off logging.
All input and output will be copied to the given file object.
Set logfile to None to stop logging. This is the default.
Set logfile to sys.stdout to echo everything to standard output.
The logfile is flushed after each write.
Example 1:
child = pexpect.spawn('some_command')
fout = file('mylog.txt','w')
child.logfile = fout
Example 2:
child = pexpect.spawn('some_command')
child.logfile = sys.stdout
The delaybeforesend helps overcome weird behavior that many users were experiencing.
The typical problem was that a user would expect() a "Password:" prompt and
then immediately call sendline() to send the password. The user would then
see that their password was echoed back to them. Of course, passwords don't
normally echo. The problem is caused by the fact that most applications
print out the "Password" prompt and then turn off stdin echo, but if you
send your password before the application turned off echo, then you get
your password echoed. Normally this wouldn't be a problem when interacting
with a human at a real heyboard. If you introduce a slight delay just before
writing then this seems to clear up the problem. This was such a common problem
for many users that I decided that the default pexpect behavior
should be to sleep just before writing to the child application.
1/10th of a second (100 ms) seems to be enough to clear up the problem.
You can set delaybeforesend to 0 to return to the old behavior.
Note that spawn is clever about finding commands on your path.
It uses the same logic that "which" uses to find executables.
If you wish to get the exit status of the child you must call
the close() method. The exit or signal status of the child will be
stored in self.exitstatus or self.signalstatus.
If the child exited normally then exitstatus will store the exit return code and
signalstatus will be None.
If the child was terminated abnormally with a signal then signalstatus will store
the signal value and exitstatus will be None.
If you need more detail you can also read the self.status member which stores
the status returned by os.waitpid. You can interpret this using
os.WIFEXITED/os.WEXITSTATUS or os.WIFSIGNALED/os.TERMSIG.
- __iter__(self)
- This is to support iterators over a file-like object.
- __str__(self)
- This returns the current state of the pexpect object as a string.
- close(self, force=True)
- This closes the connection with the child application.
Note that calling close() more than once is valid.
This emulates standard Python behavior with files.
Set force to True if you want to make sure that the child is terminated
(SIGKILL is sent if the child ignores SIGHUP and SIGINT).
- compile_pattern_list(self, patterns)
- This compiles a pattern-string or a list of pattern-strings.
Patterns must be a StringType, EOF, TIMEOUT, SRE_Pattern, or
a list of those. Patterns may also be None which results in
an empty list.
This is used by expect() when calling expect_list().
Thus expect() is nothing more than::
cpl = compile_pattern_list(pl)
return expect_list(clp, timeout)
If you are using expect() within a loop it may be more
efficient to compile the patterns first and then call expect_list().
This avoid calls in a loop to compile_pattern_list():
cpl = compile_pattern_list(my_pattern)
while some_condition:
...
i = expect_list(clp, timeout)
...
- eof(self)
- This returns True if the EOF exception was ever raised.
- expect(self, pattern, timeout=-1, searchwindowsize=None)
- This seeks through the stream until a pattern is matched.
The pattern is overloaded and may take several types including a list.
The pattern can be a StringType, EOF, a compiled re, or
a list of those types. Strings will be compiled to re types.
This returns the index into the pattern list. If the pattern was
not a list this returns index 0 on a successful match.
This may raise exceptions for EOF or TIMEOUT.
To avoid the EOF or TIMEOUT exceptions add EOF or TIMEOUT to
the pattern list.
After a match is found the instance attributes
'before', 'after' and 'match' will be set.
You can see all the data read before the match in 'before'.
You can see the data that was matched in 'after'.
The re.MatchObject used in the re match will be in 'match'.
If an error occured then 'before' will be set to all the
data read so far and 'after' and 'match' will be None.
If timeout is -1 then timeout will be set to the self.timeout value.
Note: A list entry may be EOF or TIMEOUT instead of a string.
This will catch these exceptions and return the index
of the list entry instead of raising the exception.
The attribute 'after' will be set to the exception type.
The attribute 'match' will be None.
This allows you to write code like this:
index = p.expect (['good', 'bad', pexpect.EOF, pexpect.TIMEOUT])
if index == 0:
do_something()
elif index == 1:
do_something_else()
elif index == 2:
do_some_other_thing()
elif index == 3:
do_something_completely_different()
instead of code like this:
try:
index = p.expect (['good', 'bad'])
if index == 0:
do_something()
elif index == 1:
do_something_else()
except EOF:
do_some_other_thing()
except TIMEOUT:
do_something_completely_different()
These two forms are equivalent. It all depends on what you want.
You can also just expect the EOF if you are waiting for all output
of a child to finish. For example:
p = pexpect.spawn('/bin/ls')
p.expect (pexpect.EOF)
print p.before
If you are trying to optimize for speed then see expect_list().
- expect_exact(self, pattern_list, timeout=-1)
- This method is no longer supported or allowed.
It was too hard to maintain and keep it up to date with expect_list.
Few people used this method. Most people favored reliability over speed.
The implementation is left in comments in case anyone needs to hack this
feature back into their copy.
If someone wants to diff this with expect_list and make them work
nearly the same then I will consider adding this make in.
- expect_list(self, pattern_list, timeout=-1, searchwindowsize=-1)
- This takes a list of compiled regular expressions and returns
the index into the pattern_list that matched the child's output.
The list may also contain EOF or TIMEOUT (which are not
compiled regular expressions). This method is similar to
the expect() method except that expect_list() does not
recompile the pattern list on every call.
This may help if you are trying to optimize for speed, otherwise
just use the expect() method. This is called by expect().
If timeout==-1 then the self.timeout value is used.
If searchwindowsize==-1 then the self.searchwindowsize value is used.
- fileno(self)
- This returns the file descriptor of the pty for the child.
- flush(self)
- This does nothing. It is here to support the interface for a File-like object.
- getwinsize(self)
- This returns the terminal window size of the child tty.
The return value is a tuple of (rows, cols).
- interact(self, escape_character='\x1d')
- This gives control of the child process to the interactive user
(the human at the keyboard).
Keystrokes are sent to the child process, and the stdout and stderr
output of the child process is printed.
When the user types the escape_character this method will stop.
The default for escape_character is ^] (ASCII 29).
This simply echos the child stdout and child stderr to the real
stdout and it echos the real stdin to the child stdin.
Note that if you change the window size of the parent
the SIGWINCH signal will not be passed through to the child.
If you want the child window size to change when the parent's
window size changes then do something like the following example:
import pexpect, struct, fcntl, termios, signal, sys
def sigwinch_passthrough (sig, data):
s = struct.pack("HHHH", 0, 0, 0, 0)
a = struct.unpack('hhhh', fcntl.ioctl(sys.stdout.fileno(), termios.TIOCGWINSZ , s))
global p
p.setwinsize(a[0],a[1])
p = pexpect.spawn('/bin/bash') # Note this is global and used in sigwinch_passthrough.
signal.signal(signal.SIGWINCH, sigwinch_passthrough)
p.interact()
- isalive(self)
- This tests if the child process is running or not.
This is non-blocking. If the child was terminated then this
will read the exitstatus or signalstatus of the child.
This returns True if the child process appears to be running or False if not.
It can take literally SECONDS for Solaris to return the right status.
- isatty(self)
- This returns True if the file descriptor is open and connected to a tty(-like) device, else False.
- kill(self, sig)
- This sends the given signal to the child application.
In keeping with UNIX tradition it has a misleading name.
It does not necessarily kill the child unless
you send the right signal.
- next(self)
- This is to support iterators over a file-like object.
- read(self, size=-1)
- This reads at most "size" bytes from the file
(less if the read hits EOF before obtaining size bytes).
If the size argument is negative or omitted,
read all data until EOF is reached.
The bytes are returned as a string object.
An empty string is returned when EOF is encountered immediately.
- read_nonblocking(self, size=1, timeout=-1)
- This reads at most size characters from the child application.
It includes a timeout. If the read does not complete within the
timeout period then a TIMEOUT exception is raised.
If the end of file is read then an EOF exception will be raised.
If a log file was set using setlog() then all data will
also be written to the log file.
If timeout==None then the read may block indefinitely.
If timeout==-1 then the self.timeout value is used.
If timeout==0 then the child is polled and
if there was no data immediately ready then this will raise a TIMEOUT exception.
The "timeout" refers only to the amount of time to read at least one character.
This is not effected by the 'size' parameter, so if you call
read_nonblocking(size=100, timeout=30) and only one character is
available right away then one character will be returned immediately.
It will not wait for 30 seconds for another 99 characters to come in.
This is a wrapper around os.read().
It uses select.select() to implement a timeout.
- readline(self, size=-1)
- This reads and returns one entire line. A trailing newline is kept in
the string, but may be absent when a file ends with an incomplete line.
Note: This readline() looks for a \r\n pair even on UNIX because
this is what the pseudo tty device returns. So contrary to what you
may expect you will receive the newline as \r\n.
An empty string is returned when EOF is hit immediately.
Currently, the size agument is mostly ignored, so this behavior is not
standard for a file-like object. If size is 0 then an empty string
is returned.
- readlines(self, sizehint=-1)
- This reads until EOF using readline() and returns a list containing
the lines thus read. The optional "sizehint" argument is ignored.
- send(self, str)
- This sends a string to the child process.
This returns the number of bytes written.
If a log file was set then the data is also written to the log.
- sendeof(self)
- This sends an EOF to the child.
This sends a character which causes the pending parent output
buffer to be sent to the waiting child program without
waiting for end-of-line. If it is the first character of the
line, the read() in the user program returns 0, which
signifies end-of-file. This means to work as expected
a sendeof() has to be called at the begining of a line.
This method does not send a newline. It is the responsibility
of the caller to ensure the eof is sent at the beginning of a line.
- sendline(self, str='')
- This is like send(), but it adds a line feed (os.linesep).
This returns the number of bytes written.
- setecho(self, state)
- This sets the terminal echo mode on or off.
Note that anything the child sent before the echo will be lost, so
you should be sure that your input buffer is empty before you setecho.
For example, the following will work as expected.
p = pexpect.spawn('cat')
p.sendline ('1234') # We will see this twice (once from tty echo and again from cat).
p.expect (['1234'])
p.expect (['1234'])
p.setecho(False) # Turn off tty echo
p.sendline ('abcd') # We will set this only once (echoed by cat).
p.sendline ('wxyz') # We will set this only once (echoed by cat)
p.expect (['abcd'])
p.expect (['wxyz'])
The following WILL NOT WORK because the lines sent before the setecho
will be lost:
p = pexpect.spawn('cat')
p.sendline ('1234') # We will see this twice (once from tty echo and again from cat).
p.setecho(False) # Turn off tty echo
p.sendline ('abcd') # We will set this only once (echoed by cat).
p.sendline ('wxyz') # We will set this only once (echoed by cat)
p.expect (['1234'])
p.expect (['1234'])
p.expect (['abcd'])
p.expect (['wxyz'])
- setlog(self, fileobject)
- This method is no longer supported or allowed.
- setmaxread(self, maxread)
- This method is no longer supported or allowed.
I don't like getters and setters without a good reason.
- setwinsize(self, r, c)
- This sets the terminal window size of the child tty.
This will cause a SIGWINCH signal to be sent to the child.
This does not change the physical window size.
It changes the size reported to TTY-aware applications like
vi or curses -- applications that respond to the SIGWINCH signal.
- terminate(self, force=False)
- This forces a child process to terminate.
It starts nicely with SIGHUP and SIGINT. If "force" is True then
moves onto SIGKILL.
This returns True if the child was terminated.
This returns False if the child could not be terminated.
- wait(self)
- This waits until the child exits. This is a blocking call.
This will not read any data from the child, so this will block forever
if the child has unread output and has terminated. In other words, the child
may have printed output then called exit(); but, technically, the child is
still alive until its output is read.
- write(self, str)
- This is similar to send() except that there is no return value.
- writelines(self, sequence)
- This calls write() for each element in the sequence.
The sequence can be any iterable object producing strings,
typically a list of strings. This does not add line separators
There is no return value.
Data descriptors defined here:
- __dict__
- dictionary for instance variables (if defined)
- __weakref__
- list of weak references to the object (if defined)
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