Executing External Programs

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Revision as of 16:24, 30 June 2013 by Marcov (talk | contribs) (→‎Overview : Comparison: Runcommand added)
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Overview : Comparison

Method Platforms Single Line Features
SysUtils.ExecuteProcess Cross-Platform Yes Very limited, synchronous
(ShellApi) ShellExecute MS Windows only Yes Most
Unix fpsystem, fpexecve Unix only
TProcess Cross-Platform No Full
RunCommand(InDir) Cross-Platform 2.6.2+ Yes Most frequent TProcess cases
(LCLIntf) OpenDocument Cross-Platform Yes Only open document

SysUtils.ExecuteProcess

(Cross-platform)
Despite a number of limitations, the simplest way to launch a program (modal, no pipes or any form of control) is to simply use :

SysUtils.ExecuteProcess(UTF8ToSys('/full/path/to/binary'), '', []);

The calling process runs synchronously: it 'hangs' until the external program has finished - but this may be useful if you require the user to do something before continuing in your application. For a more versatile approach, see the next section about the prefered cross-platform TProcess, or if you only wish to target Windows you may use ShellExecute.

MS Windows : CreateProcess, ShellExecute and WinExec

Light bulb  Note: While FPC/Lazarus has support for CreateProcess, ShellExecute and/or WinExec, this support is only in Win32/64. If your program is cross-platform, consider using TProcess.
Light bulb  Note: WinExec is a 16-bit call that has been deprecated for years in the Windows API. In recent versions of FPC it generates a warning.

ShellExecute is a standard MS Windows function (ShellApi.h) with good documentation on MSDN (note their remarks about initialising COM if you find the function unreliable).

uses ..., ShellApi;

// Simple one-liner (ignoring error returns) :
if ShellExecute(0,nil, PChar('"C:\my dir\prog.exe"'),PChar('"C:\somepath\some_doc.ext"'),nil,1) =0 then;

// Execute a Batch File :
if ShellExecute(0,nil, PChar('cmd'),PChar('/c mybatch.bat'),nil,1) =0 then;

// Open a command window in a given folder :
if ShellExecute(0,nil, PChar('cmd'),PChar('/k cd \path'),nil,1) =0 then;

// Open a webpage URL in the default browser using 'start' command (via a brief hidden cmd window) :
if ShellExecute(0,nil, PChar('cmd'),PChar('/c start www.lazarus.freepascal.org/'),nil,0) =0 then;

// or a useful procedure:
procedure RunShellExecute(const prog,params:string);
begin
  //  ( Handle, nil/'open'/'edit'/'find'/'explore'/'print',   // 'open' isn't always needed 
  //      path+prog, params, working folder,
  //        0=hide / 1=SW_SHOWNORMAL / 3=max / 7=min)   // for SW_ constants : uses ... Windows ...
  if ShellExecute(0,'open',PChar(prog),PChar(params),PChar(extractfilepath(prog)),1) >32 then; //success
  // return values 0..32 are errors
end;

If you need to execute external program with administrator/elevated privileges, you can use the runas method with the alternative ShellExecuteEx function:

uses ShellApi, ...;

function RunAsAdmin(const Handle: Hwnd; const Path, Params: string): Boolean;
var
  sei: TShellExecuteInfoA;
begin
  FillChar(sei, SizeOf(sei), 0);
  sei.cbSize := SizeOf(sei);
  sei.Wnd := Handle;
  sei.fMask := SEE_MASK_FLAG_DDEWAIT or SEE_MASK_FLAG_NO_UI;
  sei.lpVerb := 'runas';
  sei.lpFile := PAnsiChar(Path);
  sei.lpParameters := PAnsiChar(Params);
  sei.nShow := SW_SHOWNORMAL;
  Result := ShellExecuteExA(@sei);
end;

procedure TFormMain.RunAddOrRemoveApplication;
begin
  // Example that uses elevated rundll to open the Control Panel to Programs and features
  RunAsAdmin(FormMain.Handle, 'rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL appwiz.cpl', '');
end;

There is also ShellExecuteExW as a WideChar version, and ShellExecuteExA is AnsiChar.

The fMask option can also use SEE_MASK_DOENVSUBST or SEE_MASK_FLAG_NO_UI or SEE_MASK_NOCLOSEPROCESS, etc.

If in Delphi you used ShellExecute for documents like word documents or URLs, have a look at the open* (openurl etc) functions in lclintf (see the Alternatives section lower down this page).

If you have used ShellExecute and/or WinExec in Delphi, consider using TProcess as an alternative in FPC/Lazarus, with the advantage that it is cross-platform.

Unix fpsystem, fpexecve and shell

These functions are platform dependent.

Note that the 1.0.x 'Unix.Shell has been deprecated for a while, and is removed in trunk. Use fpsystem.

TProcess

You can use TProcess to launch external programs. Some of the benefits of using TProcess are that it is:

  • Platform Independent
  • Capable of reading from stdout and writing to stdin.
  • Possible to wait for a command to finish or let it run while your program moves on.

Important notes:

  • TProcess is not a terminal/shell! You cannot directly execute scripts or redirect output using operators like "|", ">", "<", "&" etc. It is possible to obtain the same results with TProcess using pascal, some examples are below..
  • Presumably on Linux/Unix: you must specify the full path to the executable. For example '/bin/cp' instead of 'cp'. If the program is in the standard PATH then you can use the function FindDefaultExecutablePath from the FileUtil unit of the LCL.
  • On Windows, if the command is in the path, you don't need to specify the full path.
  • TProcess reference

A Simple Example

This example just shows you how to run an external program, nothing more:

// This is a demo program that shows
// how to launch an external program.
program launchprogram;
 
// Here we include files that have useful functions
// and procedures we will need.
uses 
  Classes, SysUtils, Process;
 
// This defines the var "AProcess" as a variable 
// of the type "TProcess"
var 
  AProcess: TProcess;
 
// This is where our program starts to run
begin
  // Now we will create the TProcess object, and
  // assign it to the var AProcess.
  AProcess := TProcess.Create(nil);
 
  // Tell the new AProcess what the command to execute is.
  // Let's use the FreePascal compiler (i386 version that is)
  AProcess.Executable:= 'ppc386';
  // Pass -h together with ppc386 (so we're executing ppc386 -h):
  AProcess.Parameters.Add('-h');
  // Previous versions of FPC did not yet have .Executable and .Parameters and
  // used the .CommandLine property. While this is still available, it is deprecated
  // so it should not be used.
 
  // We will define an option for when the program
  // is run. This option will make sure that our program
  // does not continue until the program we will launch
  // has stopped running.                vvvvvvvvvvvvvv
  AProcess.Options := AProcess.Options + [poWaitOnExit];
 
  // Now let AProcess run the command in .Commandline:
  AProcess.Execute;
 
  // This is not reached until ppc386 stops running.
  AProcess.Free;   
end.

That's it! You have just learned to run an external program from inside your own program.

An improved example (but not correct yet)

That's nice, but how do I read the Output of a program that I have run?

Well, let's expand our example a little and do just that: This example is kept simple so you can learn from it. Please don't use this example in production code, but use the code in #Reading large output.

// This is a 
// FLAWED
// demo program that shows
// how to launch an external program
// and read from its output.
program launchprogram;
 
// Here we include files that have useful functions
// and procedures we will need.
uses 
  Classes, SysUtils, Process;
 
// This is defining the var "AProcess" as a variable 
// of the type "TProcess"
// Also now we are adding a TStringList to store the 
// data read from the programs output.
var 
  AProcess: TProcess;
  AStringList: TStringList;

// This is where our program starts to run
begin
  // Now we will create the TProcess object, and
  // assign it to the var AProcess.
  AProcess := TProcess.Create(nil);
 
  // Create the TStringList object.
  AStringList := TStringList.Create;
 
  // Tell the new AProcess what the command to execute is.
  // Let's use the FreePascal compiler
  AProcess.CommandLine := 'ppc386 -h';
 
  // We will define an option for when the program
  // is run. This option will make sure that our program
  // does not continue until the program we will launch
  // has stopped running. Also now we will tell it that
  // we want to read the output of the file.
  AProcess.Options := AProcess.Options + [poWaitOnExit, poUsePipes];
 
  // Now that AProcess knows what the commandline is 
  // we will run it.
  AProcess.Execute;
  
  // This is not reached until ppc386 stops running.
 
  // Now read the output of the program we just ran
  // into the TStringList.
  AStringList.LoadFromStream(AProcess.Output);
   
  // Save the output to a file.
  AStringList.SaveToFile('output.txt');
 
  // Now that the file is saved we can free the 
  // TStringList and the TProcess.
  AStringList.Free;
  AProcess.Free;   
end.

Reading large output

In the previous example we waited until the program exited. Then we read what the program has written to its output.

Suppose the program writes a lot of data to the output. Then the output pipe becomes full and the called progam waits until the pipe has been read from.

But the calling program doesn't read from it until the called program has ended. A deadlock occurs.

The following example therefore doesn't use poWaitOnExit, but reads from the output while the program is still running. The output is stored in a memory stream, that can be used later to read the output into a TStringList.

If you want to read output from an external process, this is the code you should adapt for production use.

program procoutlarge;
{
    Copyright (c) 2004-2011 by Marc Weustink and contributors
 
    This example is created in the hope that it will be useful,
    but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
    MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
}
// This is a 
// WORKING
// demo program that shows
// how to launch an external program
// and read from its output.
 
uses
  Classes, Process, SysUtils;
 
const
  READ_BYTES = 2048;
 
var
  OurCommand: String;
  OutputLines: TStringList;
  MemStream: TMemoryStream;
  OurProcess: TProcess;
  NumBytes: LongInt;
  BytesRead: LongInt;
 
begin
  // A temp Memorystream is used to buffer the output
  MemStream := TMemoryStream.Create;
  BytesRead := 0;
 
  OurProcess := TProcess.Create(nil);
  // Recursive dir is a good example.
  OurCommand:='invalid command, please fix the IFDEFS.';
  {$IFDEF Windows}
  //Can't use dir directly, it's built in
  //so we just use the shell:
  OurCommand:='cmd.exe /c "dir /s c:\windows\"';
  {$ENDIF Windows}
  {$IFDEF Unix}
  //Needs to be tested on Linux/Unix:
  OurCommand := 'ls --recursive --all -l /';
  {$ENDIF Unix}
  writeln('-- Going to run: ' + OurCommand);
  OurProcess.CommandLine := OurCommand;

  // We cannot use poWaitOnExit here since we don't
  // know the size of the output. On Linux the size of the
  // output pipe is 2 kB; if the output data is more, we
  // need to read the data. This isn't possible since we are
  // waiting. So we get a deadlock here if we use poWaitOnExit.
  OurProcess.Options := [poUsePipes];
  WriteLn('-- External program run started');
  OurProcess.Execute;
  while OurProcess.Running do
  begin          
    // make sure we have room
    MemStream.SetSize(BytesRead + READ_BYTES);
 
    // try reading it
    NumBytes := OurProcess.Output.Read((MemStream.Memory + BytesRead)^, READ_BYTES);
    if NumBytes > 0
    then begin
      Inc(BytesRead, NumBytes);
      Write('.') //Output progress to screen.
    end
    else begin     
      // no data, wait 100 ms
      Sleep(100); 
    end;
  end;
  // read last part
  repeat
    // make sure we have room
    MemStream.SetSize(BytesRead + READ_BYTES);
    // try reading it
    NumBytes := OurProcess.Output.Read((MemStream.Memory + BytesRead)^, READ_BYTES);
    if NumBytes > 0
    then begin
      Inc(BytesRead, NumBytes);
      Write('.');
    end;
  until NumBytes <= 0;
  if BytesRead > 0 then WriteLn;
  MemStream.SetSize(BytesRead);
  WriteLn('-- External program run complete');
 
  OutputLines := TStringList.Create;
  OutputLines.LoadFromStream(MemStream);
  WriteLn('-- External program output line count = ', OutputLines.Count, ' --');
  for NumBytes := 0 to OutputLines.Count - 1 do
  begin
    WriteLn(OutputLines[NumBytes]);
  end;
  WriteLn('-- Program end');
  OutputLines.Free;
  OurProcess.Free;
  MemStream.Free;
end.

Using input and output of a TProcess

See processdemo example in the Lazarus-CCR SVN.

Hints on the use of TProcess

If you are creating a cross-platform program, you can change commandline according to the OS, using directives "{$IFDEF}s" and "{$ENDIF}s".

Example:

{...}
AProcess:=TProcess.Create(nil)
{$IFDEF WIN32}
AProcess.CommandLine := 'calc.exe'; //Windows Calc
{$ENDIF}
{$IFDEF LINUX}
AProcess.CommandLine := 'kcalc'; //KDE Calc
{$ENDIF}
AProcess.Execute; //in alternative, you can use AProcess.Active:=True
{...}

OS X show application bundle in foreground

You can start an application bundle via TProcess by starting the executable within the bundle. For example:

AProcess.Executable:='/Applications/iCal.app/Contents/MacOS/iCal';

This will start the Calendar, but the window will be behind the current application. To get the application in the foreground you can use the open utility with the -n parameter:

AProcess.Executable:='/usr/bin/open';
AProcess.Parameters.Add('-n');
AProcess.Parameters.Add('/Application/iCal.app');

If your application needs parameters, you can pass open the --args parameter, after which all parameters are passed to the application:

AProcess.Parameters.Add('--args');
AProcess.Parameters.Add('argument1');
AProcess.Parameters.Add('argument2');

Example of "talking" with aspell process

Inside pasdoc source code you can find two units that perform spell-checking by "talking" with running aspell process through pipes:

  • PasDoc_ProcessLineTalk.pas unit implements TProcessLineTalk class, descendant of TProcess, that can be easily used to talk with any process on a line-by-line basis.
  • PasDoc_Aspell.pas units implements TAspellProcess class, that performs spell-checking by using underlying TProcessLineTalk instance to execute aspell and communicate with running aspell process.

Both units are rather independent from the rest of pasdoc sources, so they may serve as real-world examples of using TProcess to run and communicate through pipes with other program.

Replacing shell operators like "| < >"

Sometimes you want to run a more complicated command that pipes its data to another command or to a file. Something like

ShellExecute('firstcommand.exe | secondcommand.exe');

or

ShellExecute('dir > output.txt');

Executing this with TProcess will not work. i.e:

// this won't work
Process.CommandLine := 'firstcommand.exe | secondcommand.exe'; 
Process.Execute;

Why using special operators to redirect output doesn't work

TProcess is just that, it's not a shell environment, only a process. It's not two processes, it's only one. It is possible to redirect output however just the way you wanted. See the next section.

How to redirect output with TProcess

You can redirect the output of a command to another command by using a TProcess instance for each command.

Here's an example that explains how to redirect the output of one process to another. To redirect the output of a process to a file/stream see the example Reading Large Output

Not only can you redirect the "normal" output (also known as stdout), but you can also redirect the error output (stderr), if you specify the poStderrToOutPut option, as seen in the options for the second process.

program Project1;
  
uses
  Classes, sysutils, process;
  
var
  FirstProcess,
  SecondProcess: TProcess;
  Buffer: array[0..127] of char;
  ReadCount: Integer;
  ReadSize: Integer;
begin
  FirstProcess  := TProcess.Create(nil);
  SecondProcess := TProcess.Create(nil);
 
  FirstProcess.Options  := [poUsePipes];
  SecondProcess.Options := [poUsePipes,poStderrToOutPut];
  
  FirstProcess.CommandLine  := 'pwd';
  SecondProcess.CommandLine := 'grep '+ DirectorySeparator+ ' -';    
  // this would be the same as "pwd | grep / -"
  
  FirstProcess.Execute;
  SecondProcess.Execute;
  
  while FirstProcess.Running or (FirstProcess.Output.NumBytesAvailable > 0) do
  begin
    if FirstProcess.Output.NumBytesAvailable > 0 then
    begin
      // make sure that we don't read more data than we have allocated
      // in the buffer
      ReadSize := FirstProcess.Output.NumBytesAvailable;
      if ReadSize > SizeOf(Buffer) then
        ReadSize := SizeOf(Buffer);
      // now read the output into the buffer
      ReadCount := FirstProcess.Output.Read(Buffer[0], ReadSize);
      // and write the buffer to the second process
      SecondProcess.Input.Write(Buffer[0], ReadCount);
  
      // if SecondProcess writes much data to it's Output then 
      // we should read that data here to prevent a deadlock
      // see the previous example "Reading Large Output"
    end;
  end;
  // Close the input on the SecondProcess
  // so it finishes processing it's data
  SecondProcess.CloseInput;
 
  // and wait for it to complete
  // be carefull what command you run because it may not exit when
  // it's input is closed and the following line may loop forever
  while SecondProcess.Running do
    Sleep(1);
  // that's it! the rest of the program is just so the example
  // is a little 'useful'

  // we will reuse Buffer to output the SecondProcess's
  // output to *this* programs stdout
  WriteLn('Grep output Start:');
  ReadSize := SecondProcess.Output.NumBytesAvailable;
  if ReadSize > SizeOf(Buffer) then
    ReadSize := SizeOf(Buffer);
  if ReadSize > 0 then
  begin
    ReadCount := SecondProcess.Output.Read(Buffer, ReadSize);
    WriteLn(Copy(Buffer,0, ReadCount));
  end
  else
    WriteLn('grep did not find what we searched for. ', SecondProcess.ExitStatus);
  WriteLn('Grep output Finish:');
  
  // free our process objects
  FirstProcess.Free;
  SecondProcess.Free;
end.

That's it. Now you can redirect output from one program to another.

Notes

This example may seem overdone since it's possible to run "complicated" commands using a shell with TProcess like:

Process.Commandline := 'sh -c "pwd | grep / -"';

But our example is more crossplatform since it needs no modification to run on Windows or Linux etc. "sh" may or may not exist on your platform and is generally only available on *nix platforms. Also we have more flexibility in our example since you can read and write from/to the input, output and stderr of each process individually, which could be very advantageous for your project.

Redirecting input and output and running under root

A common problem on Unixes (OSX) and Linux is that you want to execute some program under the root account (or, more generally, another user account). An example would be running the ping command.

If you can use sudo for this, you could adapt the following example adapted from one posted by andyman on the forum ([1]). This sample runs ls on the /root directory, but can of course be adapted.

A better way to do this is to use the policykit package, which should be available on all recent Linuxes. See the forum thread for details.

Large parts of this code are similar to the earlier example, but it also shows how to redirect stdout and stderr of the process being called separately to stdout and stderr of our own code.

program rootls;

{ Demonstrates using TProcess, redirecting stdout/stderr to our stdout/stderr,
calling sudo on Linux/OSX, and supplying input on stdin}
{$mode objfpc}{$H+}

uses
  Classes,
  Math, {for min}
  Process;

  procedure RunsLsRoot;
  var
    Proc: TProcess;
    CharBuffer: array [0..511] of char;
    ReadCount: integer;
    ExitCode: integer;
    SudoPassword: string;
  begin
    WriteLn('Please enter the sudo password:');
    Readln(SudoPassword);
    ExitCode := -1; //Start out with failure, let's see later if it works
    Proc := TProcess.Create(nil); //Create a new process
    try
      Proc.Options := [poUsePipes, poStderrToOutPut]; //Use pipes to redirect program stdin,stdout,stderr
      Proc.CommandLine := 'sudo -S ls /root'; //Run ls /root as root using sudo
      // -S causes sudo to read the password from stdin.
      Proc.Execute; //start it. sudo will now probably ask for a password

      // write the password to stdin of the sudo program:
      SudoPassword := SudoPassword + LineEnding;
      Proc.Input.Write(SudoPassword[1], Length(SudoPassword));
      SudoPassword := '%*'; //short string, hope this will scramble memory a bit; note: using PChars is more fool-proof
      SudoPassword := ''; // and make the program a bit safer from snooping?!?

      // main loop to read output from stdout and stderr of sudo
      while Proc.Running or (Proc.Output.NumBytesAvailable > 0) or
        (Proc.Stderr.NumBytesAvailable > 0) do
      begin
        // read stdout and write to our stdout
        while Proc.Output.NumBytesAvailable > 0 do
        begin
          ReadCount := Min(512, Proc.Output.NumBytesAvailable); //Read up to buffer, not more
          Proc.Output.Read(CharBuffer, ReadCount);
          Write(StdOut, Copy(CharBuffer, 0, ReadCount));
        end;
        // read stderr and write to our stderr
        while Proc.Stderr.NumBytesAvailable > 0 do
        begin
          ReadCount := Min(512, Proc.Stderr.NumBytesAvailable); //Read up to buffer, not more
          Proc.Stderr.Read(CharBuffer, ReadCount);
          Write(StdErr, Copy(CharBuffer, 0, ReadCount));
        end;
      end;
      ExitCode := Proc.ExitStatus;
    finally
      Proc.Free;
      Halt(ExitCode);
    end;
  end;

begin
  RunsLsRoot;
end.

Other thoughts: It would no doubt be advisable to see if sudo actually prompts for a password. This can be checked consistently by setting the environment variable SUDO_PROMPT to something we watch for while reading the stdout of TProcess avoiding the problem of the prompt being different for different locales. Setting an environment variable causes the default values to be cleared(inherited from our process) so we have to copy the environment from our program if needed.

Using fdisk with sudo on Linux

The following example shows how to run fdisk on a Linux machine using the sudo command to get root permissions.

program getpartitioninfo;
{Originally contributed by Lazarus forums wjackon153. Please contact him for questions, remarks etc.
Modified from Lazarus snippet to FPC program for ease of understanding/conciseness by BigChimp}

Uses
  Classes, SysUtils, FileUtil, Process;

var
  hprocess: TProcess;
  sPass: String;
  OutputLines: TStringList;

begin  
  sPass := 'yoursudopasswordhere'; // You need to change this to your own sudo password
  OutputLines:=TStringList.Create; //... a try...finally block would be nice to make sure 
  // OutputLines is freed... Same for hProcess.
     
  // The following example will open fdisk in the background and give us partition information
  // Since fdisk requires elevated priviledges we need to 
  // pass our password as a parameter to sudo using the -S
  // option, so it will will wait till our program sends our password to the sudo application
  hProcess := TProcess.Create(nil);
  // On Linux/Unix/OSX, we need specify full path to our executable:
  hProcess.Executable := '/bin/sh';
  // Now we add all the parameters on the command line:
  hprocess.Parameters.Add('-c');
  // Here we pipe the password to the sudo command which then executes fdisk -l: 
  hprocess.Parameters.add('echo ' + sPass  + ' | sudo -S fdisk -l');
  // Run asynchronously (wait for process to exit) and use pipes so we can read the output pipe
  hProcess.Options := hProcess.Options + [poWaitOnExit, poUsePipes];
  // Now run:
  hProcess.Execute;

  // hProcess should have now run the external executable (because we use poWaitOnExit).
  // Now you can process the process output (standard output and standard error), eg:
  OutputLines.Add('stdout:');
  OutputLines.LoadFromStream(hprocess.Output);
  OutputLines.Add('stderr:');
  OutputLines.LoadFromStream(hProcess.Stderr);
  // Show output on screen:
  writeln(OutputLines.Text);

  // Clean up to avoid memory leaks:
  hProcess.Free;
  OutputLines.Free;
  
  //Below are some examples as you see we can pass illegal characters just as if done from terminal 
  //Even though you have read elsewhere that you can not I assure with this method you can :)

  //hprocess.Parameters.Add('ping -c 1 www.google.com');
  //hprocess.Parameters.Add('ifconfig wlan0 | grep ' +  QuotedStr('inet addr:') + ' | cut -d: -f2');

  //Using QuotedStr() is not a requirement though it makes for cleaner code;
  //you can use double quote and have the same effect.

  //hprocess.Parameters.Add('glxinfo | grep direct');   

  // This method can also be used for installing applications from your repository:

  //hprocess.Parameters.add('echo ' + sPass  + ' | sudo -S apt-get install -y pkg-name'); 

 end.


Parameters which contain spaces (Replacing Shell Quotes)

In the Linux shell it is possible to write quoted arguments like this:

gdb --batch --eval-command="info symbol 0x0000DDDD" myprogram

And GDB will receive 3 arguments (in addition to the first argument which is the full path to the executable):

  1. --batch
  2. --eval-command=info symbol 0x0000DDDD
  3. the full path to myprogram

TProcess can also pass parameters containing spaces, but it uses a different quoting style. Instead of only quoting part of the parameter, quote all of it. Like this:

TProcess.CommandLine := '/usr/bin/gdb --batch "--eval-command=info symbol 0x0000DDDD" /home/me/myprogram';

And also remember to only pass full paths.

See also this discussion about it: http://bugs.freepascal.org/view.php?id=14446

LCLIntf Alternatives

Sometimes, you don't need to explicitly call an external program to get the functionality you need. Instead of opening an application and specifying the document to go with it, just ask the OS to open the document and let it use the default application associated with that file type. Below are some examples.

Open document in default application

In some situations you need to open some document/file using default associated application rather then execute particular program. This depends on running operating system and Lazarus provides platform independent procedure OpenDocument which will handle it for you. Your application will continue running without waiting for the document process to close.

uses LCLIntf;
...
OpenDocument('manual.pdf');  
...

Open web page in default web browser

Just pass the URL required, the leading http:// appears to be optional. Also, passing a filename appears to give same results as OpenDocument()

uses LCLIntf;
...
OpenURL('www.lazarus.freepascal.org/');

Or, you could use TProcess like this:

uses Process; // not LCLIntf;

procedure OpenWebPage(URL: string);
// Apparently you need to pass your URL inside ", like "www.lazarus.freepascal.org"
var
  Browser, Params: string;
begin
  FindDefaultBrowser(Browser, Params);
  with TProcess.Create(nil) do
  try
    Executable := Browser;
    Params:=Format(Params, [URL]);
    Params:=copy(Params,2,length(Params)-2); // remove "", the new version of TProcess.Parameters does that itself
    Parameters.Add(Params);
    Options := [poNoConsole];
    Execute;
  finally
    Free;
  end;
end;

See also