Java Runtime.getRuntime(): getting output from executing a command line program

Here is the way to go:

Runtime rt = Runtime.getRuntime();
String[] commands = {"system.exe", "-get t"};
Process proc = rt.exec(commands);

BufferedReader stdInput = new BufferedReader(new 
     InputStreamReader(proc.getInputStream()));

BufferedReader stdError = new BufferedReader(new 
     InputStreamReader(proc.getErrorStream()));

// Read the output from the command
System.out.println("Here is the standard output of the command:\n");
String s = null;
while ((s = stdInput.readLine()) != null) {
    System.out.println(s);
}

// Read any errors from the attempted command
System.out.println("Here is the standard error of the command (if any):\n");
while ((s = stdError.readLine()) != null) {
    System.out.println(s);
}

Read the Javadoc for more details here. ProcessBuilder would be a good choice to use.

At the time of this writing, all other answers that include code may result in deadlocks.

Processes have a limited buffer for stdout and stderr output. If you don't listen to them concurrently, one of them will fill up while you are trying reading the other. For example, you could be waiting to read from stdout while the process is waiting to write to stderr. You cannot read from the stdout buffer because it is empty and the process cannot write to the stderr buffer because it is full. You are each waiting on each other forever.

Here is a possible way to read the output of a process without a risk of deadlocks:

public final class Processes
{
    private static final String NEWLINE = System.getProperty("line.separator");

    /**
     * @param command the command to run
     * @return the output of the command
     * @throws IOException if an I/O error occurs
     */
    public static String run(String... command) throws IOException
    {
        ProcessBuilder pb = new ProcessBuilder(command).redirectErrorStream(true);
        Process process = pb.start();
        StringBuilder result = new StringBuilder(80);
        try (BufferedReader in = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(process.getInputStream())))
        {
            while (true)
            {
                String line = in.readLine();
                if (line == null)
                    break;
                result.append(line).append(NEWLINE);
            }
        }
        return result.toString();
    }

    /**
     * Prevent construction.
     */
    private Processes()
    {
    }
}

The key is to use ProcessBuilder.redirectErrorStream(true) which will redirect stderr into the stdout stream. This allows you to read a single stream without having to alternate between stdout and stderr. If you want to implement this manually, you will have to consume the streams in two different threads to make sure you never block.

If use are already have Apache commons-io available on the classpath, you may use:

Process p = new ProcessBuilder("cat", "/etc/something").start();
String stderr = IOUtils.toString(p.getErrorStream(), Charset.defaultCharset());
String stdout = IOUtils.toString(p.getInputStream(), Charset.defaultCharset());

A quicker way is this:

public static String execCmd(String cmd) throws java.io.IOException {
    java.util.Scanner s = new java.util.Scanner(Runtime.getRuntime().exec(cmd).getInputStream()).useDelimiter("\\A");
    return s.hasNext() ? s.next() : "";
}

Which is basically a condensed version of this:

public static String execCmd(String cmd) throws java.io.IOException {
    Process proc = Runtime.getRuntime().exec(cmd);
    java.io.InputStream is = proc.getInputStream();
    java.util.Scanner s = new java.util.Scanner(is).useDelimiter("\\A");
    String val = "";
    if (s.hasNext()) {
        val = s.next();
    }
    else {
        val = "";
    }
    return val;
}

I know this question is old but I am posting this answer because I think this may be quicker.

Edit (For Java 7 and above)

Need to close Streams and Scanners. Using AutoCloseable for neat code:

public static String execCmd(String cmd) {
    String result = null;
    try (InputStream inputStream = Runtime.getRuntime().exec(cmd).getInputStream();
            Scanner s = new Scanner(inputStream).useDelimiter("\\A")) {
        result = s.hasNext() ? s.next() : null;
    } catch (IOException e) {
        e.printStackTrace();
    }
    return result;
}