python - Multiple pipes in subprocess

Question

I am trying to use Sailfish, which takes multiple fastq files as arguments, in a ruffus pipeline. I execute Sailfish using the subprocess module in python, but <() in the subprocess call does not work even when I set shell=True.

This is the command I want to execute using python:

sailfish quant [options] -1 <(cat sample1a.fastq sample1b.fastq) -2 <(cat sample2a.fastq sample2b.fastq) -o [output_file]

or (preferably):

sailfish quant [options] -1 <(gunzip sample1a.fastq.gz sample1b.fastq.gz) -2 <(gunzip sample2a.fastq.gz sample2b.fastq.gz) -o [output_file]

A generalization:

someprogram <(someprocess) <(someprocess)

How would I go about doing this in python? Is subprocess the right approach?

Answer 1

To emulate the bash process substitution:

#!/usr/bin/env python
from subprocess import check_call

check_call('someprogram <(someprocess) <(anotherprocess)',
           shell=True, executable='/bin/bash')

In Python, you could use named pipes:

#!/usr/bin/env python
from subprocess import Popen

with named_pipes(n=2) as paths:
    someprogram = Popen(['someprogram'] + paths)
    processes = []
    for path, command in zip(paths, ['someprocess', 'anotherprocess']):
        with open(path, 'wb', 0) as pipe:
            processes.append(Popen(command, stdout=pipe, close_fds=True))
    for p in [someprogram] + processes:
        p.wait()

where named_pipes(n) is:

import os
import shutil
import tempfile
from contextlib import contextmanager

@contextmanager
def named_pipes(n=1):
    dirname = tempfile.mkdtemp()
    try:
        paths = [os.path.join(dirname, 'named_pipe' + str(i)) for i in range(n)]
        for path in paths:
            os.mkfifo(path)
        yield paths
    finally:
        shutil.rmtree(dirname)

---

Another and more preferable way (no need to create a named entry on disk) to implement the bash process substitution is to use /dev/fd/N filenames (if they are available) as suggested by @Dunes. On FreeBSD, fdescfs(5) (/dev/fd/#) creates entries for all file descriptors opened by the process. To test availability, run:

$ test -r /dev/fd/3 3</dev/null && echo /dev/fd is available

If it fails; try to symlink /dev/fd to proc(5) as it is done on some Linuxes:

$ ln -s /proc/self/fd /dev/fd

Here's /dev/fd-based implementation of someprogram <(someprocess) <(anotherprocess) bash command:

#!/usr/bin/env python3
from contextlib import ExitStack
from subprocess import CalledProcessError, Popen, PIPE

def kill(process):
    if process.poll() is None: # still running
        process.kill()

with ExitStack() as stack: # for proper cleanup
    processes = []
    for command in [['someprocess'], ['anotherprocess']]:  # start child processes
        processes.append(stack.enter_context(Popen(command, stdout=PIPE)))
        stack.callback(kill, processes[-1]) # kill on someprogram exit

    fds = [p.stdout.fileno() for p in processes]
    someprogram = stack.enter_context(
        Popen(['someprogram'] + ['/dev/fd/%d' % fd for fd in fds], pass_fds=fds))
    for p in processes: # close pipes in the parent
        p.stdout.close()
# exit stack: wait for processes
if someprogram.returncode != 0: # errors shouldn't go unnoticed
   raise CalledProcessError(someprogram.returncode, someprogram.args)

Note: on my Ubuntu machine, the subprocess code works only in Python 3.4+, despite pass_fds being available since Python 3.2.