pass a task to python via node.js

Question

pass a task to python via node.js

Hi I'm planning to develop a webapp in node.js internally used for our company. The app will mostly do bulk xml file fixing task. I wanted my users to just upload a zip file containing all the xml file the app will process it and sends it back to them for download. Is it possible to pass this xml file fixing task to python (mainly because of lxml module). After python is done with the task it will tell node.js the location of the output then node.js will inform the users.

I'm planning to do it like this exec('python fix.py someOptions', callback). Are there any side-effect with that approach?

PS: I am using windows XP with cygwin

python
node.js

Answer 1

I've tested this with node.js v0.8.18 on Windows XP (official binary)

var spawn = require('child_process').spawn,
    pythonProcess = spawn('python', ['fix.py', 'someOptions']);

pythonProcess.stdout.on('data', function(data) {
   console.log('stdout: ' + data);
});

pythonProcess.stderr.on('data', function (data) {
  console.log('stderr: ' + data);
});

pythonProcess.on('close', function (code) {
  console.log('child process exited with code ' + code);
});