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Boost:Process

Boost.Process provides a flexible framework for the C++ programming language to manage running programs, also known as processes. It empowers C++ developers to do what Java developers can do with java.lang.Runtime/java.lang.Process and .NET developers can do with System.Diagnostics.Process. Among other functionality, this includes the ability to manage the execution context of the currently running process, the ability to spawn new child processes, and a way to communicate with them them using standard C++ streams and asynchronous I/O.

The library is designed in a way to transparently abstract all process management details to the user, allowing for painless development of cross-platform applications. However, as such abstractions often restrict what the developer can do, the framework allows direct access to operating system specific functionality - obviously losing the portability features of the library.

Example

Starting a child 

#include <boost/process.hpp> 
#include <string> 
#include <vector> 

namespace bp = ::boost::process; 

int main() 
{ 
    std::string exec = "bjam"; 

    std::vector<std::string> args; 
    args.push_back("--version"); 

    bp::context ctx; 
    ctx.stdout_behavior = bp::silence_stream(); 

    bp::child c = bp::launch(exec, args, ctx); 
}

See also

Favorite site

Existing libraries