Calling matlab from python.. and have python wait for matlab to finish

I am attempting call matlab from a python script, and want python to wait while matlab loads, runs my script, and exits before continuing the python portion of my code.

From my research this should supposedly work:

import subprocess

from subprocess import Popen, PIPE

p = Popen("C:\\Program Files\\MATLAB\\R2008b\\bin\\matlab.exe -nosplash -r test() ", stdout = PIPE)

p.wait() # <--- blocks till done

print(p.communicate())

But when run the print statement runs well before matlab has even loaded. does anyone have any suggestions?

Thanks

Ben

Answer 1

[Wolfgang]

Set pipe to non-blocking first (from http://danapeerlab.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/freecell/depends/common/python/matlabpipe.py):

import fcntl, os
flags = fcntl.fctnl(p.stdout, fcntl.F_GETFL)
fcntl.fcntl(p.stdout, fcntl.F_SETFL, flags | os.O_NONBLOCK)

Answer 2

[Juan Ramirez]

Apparently this link doesn't work anymore. But you could sidestep the problem by re-structuring your code so that executing MATLAB is the final step in your python script. Then python doesn't need to wait for its completion.

Another option is to have python execute an infinite while loop that waits for a matlab output file to be written.