Parameter "--outdir" is not recognised via pythons subprocess.call but does work in terminal

Question

I would like to write a python script to automate the conversion of libreoffice ott templates to normal odt files. if I go to the terminal (bash shell) and I type:

soffice --headless --convert-to odt "/path/template.ott" --outdir '/targetpath/template.odt'

The output is as expected, an odt file in a new target location.

When I script it (like so:

oldfile
outdir = pipes.quote(/targetpath/template.odt)
subprocess.call(['soffice --headless --convert-to odt /path/template.ott --outdir /pathtarget/template.odt'])

the output gives me

[Errno 2] No such file or directory

When I try to make the call like this:

subprocess.call(["soffice", "--headless", "--convert-to", "odt", pipes.quote(oldpath),outdir])

The result is the helptext of soffice, with the the reason:

    LibreOffice 4.2.8.2 420m0(Build:2)

    Unknown option: --outdir /targetpath/template.odt
...

Indeed, for passing the command as one string, adding shell=True is a solution! thanks alot. It was indeed an allready answered question (http://stackoverflow.com/questions/18962785/oserror-errno-2-no-such-file-or-directory-while-using-python-subprocess-in-dj). However, I still cannot get it to work with the list, Again, indeed that bug was mentioned in http://stackoverflow.com/questions/15109665/subprocess-call-using-string-vs-using-list. — Tom, Jun 22 '16 at 07:45

score -1 · Accepted Answer · answered Jun 21 '16 at 11:14

-1

Why not try with os.system ?

os.system('soffice --headless --convert-to odt "/path/template.ott" --outdir "/targetpath/template.odt"')

answered Jun 21 '16 at 11:14

Teemo

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Because the `subprocess` module is meant to replace older functions such as `os.system()`. – zondo Jun 21 '16 at 11:15
indeed. os.system does work, but subprocess should replace that function. – Tom Jun 21 '16 at 13:49

Parameter "--outdir" is not recognised via pythons subprocess.call but does work in terminal

1 Answers1