Unable to run a program in PATH from Java code

Question

I am developing a Red5 media server application on a Mac (Dynamic Web Project in Eclipse). The app has to invoke FFMPEG to convert the video to a different format.

I added "/Applications/FFMPEG" to PATH variable by running the following command in Terminal:

echo 'export PATH=/Applications/FFMPEG:$PATH' >> ~/.profile

When I invoke FFMPEG from terminal, it works fine. However, every time I run it from Java code with:

Process p = Runtime.getRuntime().exec("ffmpeg");
p.waitFor();

I get the following error:

Cannot run program "ffmpeg": error=2, No such file or directory

I thought this might be a security limitation specific to the type of project, but even a simple Java program produces the same result. What am I missing?

Changing "ffmpeg" to full path of the application works, but I don't want to upload FFMPEG into the same directory as Red5 on a production server.

Bohemian · Accepted Answer · 2012-11-17 00:16:28Z

2

PATH is a command prompt thing. Java knows nothing about paths.

Specify the full path (ie the absolute path) of your executable

answered Nov 17, 2012 at 0:16

Bohemian♦

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2 Comments

Jason Sperske Over a year ago

Or use Apache Commons Exec (this question can help: stackoverflow.com/questions/2693020/…)

ldwii Over a year ago

Thank you for explanation. I tried commons-exec, and 'EnvironmentUtils.getProcEnvironment();' shows that the PATH variable is unchanged, while 'echo $PATH' in Terminal shows newly included directory.

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