Getting realtime output using subprocess

You can try this:

import subprocess
import sys

process = subprocess.Popen(
    cmd, stdout=subprocess.PIPE, stderr=subprocess.PIPE
)

while True:
    out = process.stdout.read(1)
    if out == '' and process.poll() != None:
        break
    if out != '':
        sys.stdout.write(out)
        sys.stdout.flush()

If you use readline instead of read, there will be some cases where the input message is not printed. Try it with a command the requires an inline input and see for yourself.

I ran into the same problem awhile back. My solution was to ditch iterating for the read method, which will return immediately even if your subprocess isn’t finished executing, etc.

Using pexpect with non-blocking readlines will resolve this problem. It stems from the fact that pipes are buffered, and so your app’s output is getting buffered by the pipe, therefore you can’t get to that output until the buffer fills or the process dies.

By setting the buffer size to 1, you essentially force the process to not buffer the output.

p = subprocess.Popen(cmd, stdout=subprocess.PIPE, bufsize=1)
for line in iter(p.stdout.readline, b''):
    print line,
p.stdout.close()
p.wait()

Complete solution:

import contextlib
import subprocess

# Unix, Windows and old Macintosh end-of-line
newlines = ['n', 'rn', 'r']
def unbuffered(proc, stream='stdout'):
    stream = getattr(proc, stream)
    with contextlib.closing(stream):
        while True:
            out = []
            last = stream.read(1)
            # Don't loop forever
            if last == '' and proc.poll() is not None:
                break
            while last not in newlines:
                # Don't loop forever
                if last == '' and proc.poll() is not None:
                    break
                out.append(last)
                last = stream.read(1)
            out = ''.join(out)
            yield out

def example():
    cmd = ['ls', '-l', '/']
    proc = subprocess.Popen(
        cmd,
        stdout=subprocess.PIPE,
        stderr=subprocess.STDOUT,
        # Make all end-of-lines 'n'
        universal_newlines=True,
    )
    for line in unbuffered(proc):
        print line

example()

I used this solution to get realtime output on a subprocess. This loop will stop as soon as the process completes leaving out a need for a break statement or possible infinite loop.

sub_process = subprocess.Popen(my_command, close_fds=True, shell=True, stdout=subprocess.PIPE, stderr=subprocess.PIPE)

while sub_process.poll() is None:
    out = sub_process.stdout.read(1)
    sys.stdout.write(out)
    sys.stdout.flush()

Real Time Output Issue resolved:
I encountered a similar issue in Python, while capturing the real time output from C program. I added fflush(stdout); in my C code. It worked for me. Here is the code.

C program:

#include <stdio.h>
void main()
{
    int count = 1;
    while (1)
    {
        printf(" Count  %dn", count++);
        fflush(stdout);
        sleep(1);
    }
}

Python program:

#!/usr/bin/python

import os, sys
import subprocess


procExe = subprocess.Popen(".//count", shell=True, stdout=subprocess.PIPE, stderr=subprocess.PIPE, universal_newlines=True)

while procExe.poll() is None:
    line = procExe.stdout.readline()
    print("Print:" + line)

Output:

Print: Count  1
Print: Count  2
Print: Count  3

Found this "plug-and-play" function here. Worked like a charm!

import subprocess

def myrun(cmd):
    """from
    http://blog.kagesenshi.org/2008/02/teeing-python-subprocesspopen-output.html
    """
    p = subprocess.Popen(cmd, shell=True, stdout=subprocess.PIPE,
                         stderr=subprocess.STDOUT)
    stdout = []
    while True:
        line = p.stdout.readline()
        stdout.append(line)
        print line,
        if line == '' and p.poll() != None:
            break
    return ''.join(stdout)

You may use an iterator over each byte in the output of the subprocess. This allows inline update (lines ending with ‘r’ overwrite previous output line) from the subprocess:

from subprocess import PIPE, Popen

command = ["my_command", "-my_arg"]

# Open pipe to subprocess
subprocess = Popen(command, stdout=PIPE, stderr=PIPE)


# read each byte of subprocess
while subprocess.poll() is None:
    for c in iter(lambda: subprocess.stdout.read(1) if subprocess.poll() is None else {}, b''):
        c = c.decode('ascii')
        sys.stdout.write(c)
sys.stdout.flush()

if subprocess.returncode != 0:
    raise Exception("The subprocess did not terminate correctly.")

This is the basic skeleton that I always use for this. It makes it easy to implement timeouts and is able to deal with inevitable hanging processes.

import subprocess
import threading
import Queue

def t_read_stdout(process, queue):
    """Read from stdout"""

    for output in iter(process.stdout.readline, b''):
        queue.put(output)

    return

process = subprocess.Popen(['dir'],
                           stdout=subprocess.PIPE,
                           stderr=subprocess.STDOUT,
                           bufsize=1,
                           cwd='C:\',
                           shell=True)

queue = Queue.Queue()
t_stdout = threading.Thread(target=t_read_stdout, args=(process, queue))
t_stdout.daemon = True
t_stdout.start()

while process.poll() is None or not queue.empty():
    try:
        output = queue.get(timeout=.5)

    except Queue.Empty:
        continue

    if not output:
        continue

    print(output),

t_stdout.join()

You can direct the subprocess output to the streams directly. Simplified example:

subprocess.run(['ls'], stderr=sys.stderr, stdout=sys.stdout)

Depending on the use case, you might also want to disable the buffering in the subprocess itself.

If the subprocess will be a Python process, you could do this before the call:

os.environ["PYTHONUNBUFFERED"] = "1"

Or alternatively pass this in the env argument to Popen.

Otherwise, if you are on Linux/Unix, you can use the stdbuf tool. E.g. like:

cmd = ["stdbuf", "-oL"] + cmd

See also here about stdbuf or other options.

(See also here for the same answer.)

The Streaming subprocess stdin and stdout with asyncio in Python blog post by Kevin McCarthy shows how to do it with asyncio:

import asyncio
from asyncio.subprocess import PIPE
from asyncio import create_subprocess_exec


async def _read_stream(stream, callback):
    while True:
        line = await stream.readline()
        if line:
            callback(line)
        else:
            break


async def run(command):
    process = await create_subprocess_exec(
        *command, stdout=PIPE, stderr=PIPE
    )

    await asyncio.wait(
        [
            _read_stream(
                process.stdout,
                lambda x: print(
                    "STDOUT: {}".format(x.decode("UTF8"))
                ),
            ),
            _read_stream(
                process.stderr,
                lambda x: print(
                    "STDERR: {}".format(x.decode("UTF8"))
                ),
            ),
        ]
    )

    await process.wait()


async def main():
    await run("docker build -t my-docker-image:latest .")


if __name__ == "__main__":
    loop = asyncio.get_event_loop()
    loop.run_until_complete(main())

(This solution has been tested with Python 2.7.15)
You just need to sys.stdout.flush() after each line read/write:

while proc.poll() is None:
    line = proc.stdout.readline()
    sys.stdout.write(line)
    # or print(line.strip()), you still need to force the flush.
    sys.stdout.flush()

In Python 3.x the process might hang because the output is a byte array instead of a string. Make sure you decode it into a string.

Starting from Python 3.6 you can do it using the parameter encoding in Popen Constructor. The complete example:

process = subprocess.Popen(
    'my_command',
    stdout=subprocess.PIPE,
    stderr=subprocess.STDOUT,
    shell=True,
    encoding='utf-8',
    errors='replace'
)

while True:
    realtime_output = process.stdout.readline()

    if realtime_output == '' and process.poll() is not None:
        break

    if realtime_output:
        print(realtime_output.strip(), flush=True)

Note that this code redirects stderr to stdout and handles output errors.

Few answers suggesting python 3.x or pthon 2.x , Below code will work for both.

 p = subprocess.Popen(cmd, shell=True, stdout=subprocess.PIPE, stderr=subprocess.STDOUT,)
    stdout = []
    while True:
        line = p.stdout.readline()
        if not isinstance(line, (str)):
            line = line.decode('utf-8')
        stdout.append(line)
        print (line)
        if (line == '' and p.poll() != None):
            break

if you just want to forward the log to console in realtime

Below code will work for both

 p = subprocess.Popen(cmd,
                         shell=True,
                         cwd=work_dir,
                         bufsize=1,
                         stdin=subprocess.PIPE,
                         stderr=sys.stderr,
                         stdout=sys.stdout)

def run_command(command):
process = subprocess.Popen(shlex.split(command), stdout=subprocess.PIPE)
while True:
    output = process.stdout.readline()
    if output == '' and process.poll() is not None:
        break
    if output:
        print(output.strip())
rc = process.poll()
return rc

Here is what worked for me:

import subprocess
import sys

def run_cmd_print_output_to_console_and_log_to_file(cmd, log_file_path):
    make_file_if_not_exist(log_file_path)
    logfile = open(log_file_path, 'w')

    proc=subprocess.Popen(cmd, stdout=subprocess.PIPE, stderr=subprocess.STDOUT, shell = True)
    for line in proc.stdout:
        sys.stdout.write(line.decode("utf-8") )
        print(line.decode("utf-8").strip(), file=logfile, flush=True)
    proc.wait()

    logfile.close()

Yet another answer! I had the following requirements:

• Run some command and print the output to stdout as though the user ran it
• Display to the user any prompts from the command. E.g. pip uninstall numpy will prompt with ... Proceed (Y/n)? (which does not end in a newline)
• Capture the output (that the user saw) as a string

This worked for me (only tested in Python 3.10 on Windows):

def run(*args: list[str]) -> str:
    proc = subprocess.Popen(
        *args,
        text=True,
        stdout=subprocess.PIPE,
        stderr=subprocess.STDOUT,
    )

    result = ""

    while proc.poll() is None:
        output = proc.stdout.read(1)

        if output:
            sys.stdout.write(output)
            sys.stdout.flush()
            result += output

    return result

These are all great examples, but I’ve found they either (a) handle partial lines (eg "Are you sure (Y/n):") but are really slow or b) are quick but hang on partial lines.

I’ve worked on the following which:

• provides real-time output for both stdout and stderr to their respective streams
• is extremely fast as it works with stream buffering
• allows for using timeouts as it never blocks on read()
• efficiently saves stdout and stderr independently
• handles text encoding (though easily adaptable to binary streams)
• works on Python 3.6+

import os
import subprocess
import sys
import selectors
import io

def run_command(command: str) -> (int, str):

    proc = subprocess.Popen(
        command, shell=True, stdout=subprocess.PIPE, stderr=subprocess.PIPE
    )

    sel = selectors.DefaultSelector()
    for fobj in [ proc.stdout, proc.stderr ]:
        os.set_blocking(fobj.fileno(), False)
        sel.register(fobj, selectors.EVENT_READ)

    out=io.StringIO()
    err=io.StringIO()

    # loop until all descriptors removed
    while len(sel.get_map()) > 0:
        events = sel.select()
        if len(events) == 0:
            # timeout or signal, kill to prevent wait hanging
            proc.terminate()
            break
        for key, _ in events:
            # read all available data
            buf = key.fileobj.read().decode(errors='ignore')
            if buf == '':
                sel.unregister(key.fileobj)
            elif key.fileobj == proc.stdout:
                sys.stdout.write(buf)
                sys.stdout.flush()
                out.write(buf)
            elif key.fileobj == proc.stderr:
                sys.stderr.write(buf)
                sys.stderr.flush()
                err.write(buf)

    sel.close()
    proc.wait()
    if proc.returncode != 0:
        return (proc.returncode, err.getvalue())
    return (0, out.getvalue())

I didn’t include the timeout logic (as the subject is real-time output), but it’s simple to add them to select()/wait() and no longer worry about infinite hangs.

I’ve timed cat '25MB-file' and compared to the .read(1) solutions, it’s roughly 300 times faster.