CFEXECUTE |
Description Executes a ColdFusion developer-specified process on a server computer.
Category Extensibility tags, Flow-control tags
Syntax
    <cfexecute
       name = "application name"
       arguments = "command line arguments"
       outputFile = "output filename"
       variable = "variable name"
       timeout = "timeout interval">
       ...
    </cfexecute>
See also cfcollection, cfindex, cfobject, cfreport, cfsearch, cfwddx
History ColdFusion MX 6.1:

- Added the variable attribute.
- Changed file path behavior for the outputFile attribute: if you do not specify an absolute file path in the outputFile attribute, the path is relative to the ColdFusion temporary directory.

Usage Do not put other ColdFusion tags or functions between the start and end tags of cfexecute. You cannot nest cfexecute tags.
Exceptions Throws the following exceptions:

- If the application name is not found: java.io.IOException
- If the effective user of the ColdFusion executing thread does not have permissions to execute the process: a security exception

The time out values must be between zero and the longest time out value supported by the operating system.

Example
    <h3>cfexecute</h3>
    <p>This example executes the Windows NT version of the netstat network
    monitoring program, and places its output in a file.

    <cfexecute name = "C:\WinNT\System32\netstat.exe"
       arguments = "-e"
       outputFile = "C:\Temp\output.txt"
       timeout = "1">
    </cfexecute>

NAME |
| Required
Absolute path of the application to execute. On Windows, you must specify an extension; for example, C:\myapp.exe.

ARGUMENTS |
| Optional
Command-line variables passed to application. If specified as string, it is processed as follows:

- Windows: passed to process control subsystem for parsing.
- UNIX: tokenized into an array of arguments. The default token separator is a space; you can delimit arguments that have embedded spaces with double-quotation marks.

If passed as array, it is processed as follows:

- Windows: Elements are concatenated into a string of tokens, separated by spaces. Passed to process control subsystem for parsing.
- UNIX: Elements are copied into an array of exec() arguments.

OUTPUTFILE |
| Optional
File to which to direct program output. If no outputfile or variable attribute is specified, output is displayed on the page from which it was called. If not an absolute path (starting a with a drive letter and a colon, or a forward or backward slash), it is relative to the ColdFusion temporary directory, which is returned by the GetTempDirectory function.

VARIABLE |
| Optional
Variable in which to put program output. If no outputfile or variable attribute is specified, output is displayed on page from which it was called.

TIMEOUT |
| Optional
Default value: "0" Length of time, in seconds, that ColdFusion waits for output from the spawned program.

- 0: equivalent to nonblocking mode.
- A very high value: equivalent to blocking mode.

If the value is 0:

- ColdFusion starts a process and returns immediately. ColdFusion may return control to the calling page before any program output displays. To ensure that program output displays, set the value to 2 or higher.
- If the outputFile attribute is not specified, any program output is discarded