I'm trying to use tesseract to do OCR on an image in java. I realize there are wrappers like Tess4J that provide a bunch more functionality and stuff, but I've been struggling to get it set up properly. Simply running a one-line command with Runtime is really all I need anyways since this is just a personal little project and doesn't need to work on other computers or anything.
I have this code:
import java.io.IOException;
public class Test {
public static void main(String[] args) {
System.out.println(scan("full-path-to-test-image"));
}
public static String scan(String imgPath) {
String contents = "";
String cmd = "[full-path-to-tesseract-binary] " + imgPath + " stdout";
try { contents = execCmd(cmd); }
catch (IOException e) { e.printStackTrace(); }
return contents;
}
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() : "";
}
}
When it's compiled and run directly from terminal, it works perfectly. When I open the exact same file in eclipse, however, it gives an IOException:
java.io.IOException: Cannot run program "tesseract": error=2, No such file or directory
What's going on? Thank you for any help.
Check the working folder in the run configuration for the Test class in Eclipse. I bet it's different from the one when you run the same program from a terminal.
I have the following script, of which you can see below. The function of this Java script is to copy a Mac app, of which is placed in the same folder as the java program. It first finds the path of the folder, which the app and java program is in. It then copies all the content to the documents folder on the Mac device. When that is done it is then supposed to run that app of which it has copied to the documents folder.
The only issue is that it isn't able to do so. The reason being that whenever it copies the app, the JavaAppLauncher which is found within the content of the mac app has changed from a unix executable to a regular TextEdit document and thus can't actually launch the app. However if I were to copy the app manually by copying it myself and not using the java program, there is no issue. I am not sure whether this issue is caused by my code, or whether it is just a general thing?
Important note, the .app does work when I just run the regular non copied version, but as soon as it is the copied version, which as been copied through Java it doesn't work because the change of the Unix executable.
public class LaunchProg {
static String usernameMac2 = System.getProperty("user.name");
static File propFile = new File (".");
static String pathString = propFile.getAbsolutePath();
static int pathhLeng = pathString.length();
static int pathReaLeng = pathhLeng -1;
static String filNamMac = "AppNam.app";
static String pFPathRelMac = pathString.substring(0,pathReaLeng);
private static final File fSourceMac = new File(pFPathRelMac);
private static final File AppFold = new File ("/Users/" + usernameMac2 + "/Documents");
static File fileCret = new File("fCret.txt");
public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {
System.out.println(pFPathRelMac);
launchMac();
}
static void launchMac() throws IOException {
if (!fileCret.exists()){
try {
FileUtils.copyDirectory(fSourceMac, AppFold);
PrintWriter pFW = new PrintWriter(fileCret);
pFW.println("Created File For Check");
pFW.close();
} catch (IOException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
} finally {
String command = "open /Users/" + usernameMac2 + "/Documents/AppNam.app";
Process staAp2 = Runtime.getRuntime().exec(command);
}
}
}
}
I'm developing a vehicle storage application. One feature is being able to store documents in different formats (word, excel, pdf) on a remote server WITHOUT having to map the server as separate drive.
Everything works fine if the file to be opened is on the local hard drive (ie, "C:/Documents/FileToOpen.docx"), but I can't figure out the path structure for a path (ie, "C:/Documents/FileToOpen.docx" on server "SERVER06"). I've tried "//SERVER06/C/Documents/FileToOpen.docx" and permutations thereof, but no joy so far.
public class Attachments extends javax.swing.JFrame {
String docPath = "C:/Program Files/Microsoft Office/Office14/WINWORD.EXE";
String excelPath = "C:/Program Files/Microsoft Office/Office14/EXCEL.EXE";
String pdfPath = "C:/Program Files/Adobe/Reader 11.0/Reader/AcroRd32.exe";
/**
* Creates new form Attachments
*/
public Attachments() {
initComponents();
setDefaultCloseOperation(WindowConstants.DO_NOTHING_ON_CLOSE);
this.setResizable(false);
}
public void setList(Set attachmentList) {
DefaultListModel model = new DefaultListModel();
Iterator i = attachmentList.iterator();
int counter = 0;
while (i.hasNext()) {
model.add(counter, (Attachment) i.next());
counter++;
}
listAttachments.setModel(model);
}
//form generation
private void btnViewActionPerformed(java.awt.event.ActionEvent evt) {
Attachment a = (Attachment) listAttachments.getSelectedValue();
String type = a.getAttachmentUrl().substring(a.getAttachmentUrl().indexOf("."));
String prog = "";
if (type.substring(0, 2).equals(".d")) {
prog = docPath;
} else if (type.substring(0, 2).equals(".p")) {
prog = pdfPath;
} else if (type.substring(0, 2).equals(".x")) {
prog = excelPath;
}
String commandString = "\"" + prog + "\" \"" + a.getAttachmentUrl() + "\"";
Runtime rt = Runtime.getRuntime();
try {
rt.exec(commandString);
} catch (IOException ex) {
System.out.println(ex.getMessage());
ex.printStackTrace();
}
}
private void jButtonCloseActionPerformed(java.awt.event.ActionEvent evt) {
this.setVisible(false);
this.dispose();
}
Is there a way to accomplish this?
Assuming your server is using Windows operating system, the server firstly need to share the folder that contains the documents. To do this, go to the server, select the folder, right click and choose 'share'. To verify, go back to the client machine, open windows explorer and type \SERVER06
If your folder sharing is successful, you should see a folder called 'Documents'. If all these are fine this far, your application just need to open the file using "\\SERVER06\Documents\FileToOpen.docx".
Along the lines of "This tape will self-destruct in five seconds. Good luck, Jim"...
Would it be possible for an application to delete itself (or it's executable wrapper form) once a preset time of use or other condition has been reached?
Alternatively, what other approaches could be used to make the application useless?
The aim here is to have a beta expire, inviting users to get a more up-to-date version.
It is possible. To get around the lock on the JAR file, your application may need to spawn a background process that waits until the JVM has exited before deleting stuff.
However, this isn't bomb-proof. Someone could install the application and then make the installed files and directories read-only so that your application can't delete itself. The user (or their administrator) via the OS'es access control system has the final say on what files are created and deleted.
If you control where testers download your application, you could use an automated build system (e.g. Jenkins) that you could create a new beta versions every night that has a hard-coded expiry date:
private static final Date EXPIRY_DATE = <90 days in the future from build date>;
the above date is automatically inserted by the build process
if (EXPIRY_DATE.before(new Date()) {
System.out.println("Get a new beta version, please");
System.exit(1);
}
Mix that with signed and sealed jars, to put obstacles in the way of decompiling the bytecode and providing an alternative implementation that doesn't include that code, you can hand out a time-expiring beta of the code.
The automated build system could be configured to automatically upload the beta version to the server hosting the download version.
Since Windows locks the JAR file while it is running, you cannot delete it from your own Java code hence you need a Batch file:
private static void selfDestructWindowsJARFile() throws Exception
{
String resourceName = "self-destruct.bat";
File scriptFile = File.createTempFile(FilenameUtils.getBaseName(resourceName), "." + FilenameUtils.getExtension(resourceName));
try (FileWriter fileWriter = new FileWriter(scriptFile);
PrintWriter printWriter = new PrintWriter(fileWriter))
{
printWriter.println("taskkill /F /IM \"java.exe\"");
printWriter.println("DEL /F \"" + ProgramDirectoryUtilities.getCurrentJARFilePath() + "\"");
printWriter.println("start /b \"\" cmd /c del \"%~f0\"&exit /b");
}
Desktop.getDesktop().open(scriptFile);
}
public static void selfDestructJARFile() throws Exception
{
if (SystemUtils.IS_OS_WINDOWS)
{
selfDestructWindowsJARFile();
} else
{
// Unix does not lock the JAR file so we can just delete it
File directoryFilePath = ProgramDirectoryUtilities.getCurrentJARFilePath();
Files.delete(directoryFilePath.toPath());
}
System.exit(0);
}
ProgramDirectoryUtilities class:
public class ProgramDirectoryUtilities
{
private static String getJarName()
{
return new File(ProgramDirectoryUtilities.class.getProtectionDomain()
.getCodeSource()
.getLocation()
.getPath())
.getName();
}
public static boolean isRunningFromJAR()
{
String jarName = getJarName();
return jarName.contains(".jar");
}
public static String getProgramDirectory()
{
if (isRunningFromJAR())
{
return getCurrentJARDirectory();
} else
{
return getCurrentProjectDirectory();
}
}
private static String getCurrentProjectDirectory()
{
return new File("").getAbsolutePath();
}
public static String getCurrentJARDirectory()
{
try
{
return getCurrentJARFilePath().getParent();
} catch (URISyntaxException exception)
{
exception.printStackTrace();
}
throw new IllegalStateException("Unexpected null JAR path");
}
public static File getCurrentJARFilePath() throws URISyntaxException
{
return new File(ProgramDirectoryUtilities.class.getProtectionDomain().getCodeSource().getLocation().toURI().getPath());
}
}
Solution inspired by this question.
Here is a better method for Windows:
private static void selfDestructWindowsJARFile() throws Exception
{
String currentJARFilePath = ProgramDirectoryUtilities.getCurrentJARFilePath().toString();
Runtime runtime = Runtime.getRuntime();
runtime.exec("cmd /c ping localhost -n 2 > nul && del \"" + currentJARFilePath + "\"");
}
Here is the original answer.
it is pretty possible i guess. maybe you can delete the jar like this and make sure the application vanishes given that you have the rights.
File jar = new File(".\\app.jar");
jar.deleteOnExit();
System.exit(0);
also using something like Nullsoft Scriptable Install System which enables you to write your own installed/uninstaller should help.
I want to prevent the user from running my java application multiple times in parallel.
To prevent this, I have created a lock file when am opening the application, and delete the lock file when closing the application.
When the application is running, you can not open an another instance of jar. However, if you kill the application through task manager, the window closing event in the application is not triggered and the lock file is not deleted.
How can I make sure the lock file method works or what other mechanism could I use?
You could use a FileLock, this also works in environments where multiple users share ports:
String userHome = System.getProperty("user.home");
File file = new File(userHome, "my.lock");
try {
FileChannel fc = FileChannel.open(file.toPath(),
StandardOpenOption.CREATE,
StandardOpenOption.WRITE);
FileLock lock = fc.tryLock();
if (lock == null) {
System.out.println("another instance is running");
}
} catch (IOException e) {
throw new Error(e);
}
Also survives Garbage Collection.
The lock is released once your process ends, doesn't matter if regular exit or crash or whatever.
Similar discussion is at
http://www.daniweb.com/software-development/java/threads/83331
Bind a ServerSocket. If it fails to bind then abort the startup. Since a ServerSocket can be bound only once, only single instsances of the program will be able to run.
And before you ask, no. Just because you bind a ServerSocket, does not mean you are open to network traffic. That only comes into effect once the program starts "listening" to the port with accept().
I see two options you can try:
Use a Java shutdown hook
Have your lock file hold the main process number. The process should exist when you lanuch another instance. If it's not found in your system, you can assume that the lock can be dismissed and overwritten.
Creating a server socket, bounds to a specific port with a ServerSocket instance as the application starts is a straight way.
Note that ServerSocket.accept() blocks, so running it in its own thread makes sense to not block the main Thread.
Here is an example with a exception thrown as detected :
public static void main(String[] args) {
assertNoOtherInstanceRunning();
... // application code then
}
public static void assertNoOtherInstanceRunning() {
new Thread(() -> {
try {
new ServerSocket(9000).accept();
} catch (IOException e) {
throw new RuntimeException("the application is probably already started", e);
}
}).start();
}
You could write the process id of the process that created the lock file into the file.
When you encounter an existing lock file, you do not just quit, but you check if the process with that id is still alive. If not, you can go ahead.
You can create a Server socket like
new ServerSocket(65535, 1, InetAddress.getLocalHost());
at very beginning of your code. Then if AddressAlreadyInUse exception caught in main block you can display the appropriate message.
There are already available java methods in File class to achieve the same. The method is deleteOnExit() which ensure the file is automatically deleted when the JVM exits. However, it does not cater to forcible terminations. One should use FileLock in case of forcible termination.
For more details check, https://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/io/File.html
Thus code snippet which could be used in the main method can be like :
public static void main(String args[]) throws Exception {
File f = new File("checkFile");
if (!f.exists()) {
f.createNewFile();
} else {
System.out.println("App already running" );
return;
}
f.deleteOnExit();
// whatever your app is supposed to do
System.out.println("Blah Blah")
}
..what other mechanism could I use?
If the app. has a GUI it can be launched using Java Web Start. The JNLP API provided to web-start offers the SingleInstanceService. Here is my demo. of the SingleInstanceService.
You can write something like this.
If file exists try to delete it. if it is not able to delete. We can say that application is already running.
Now create the same file again and redirect the sysout and syserr.
This works for me
Simple lock and advanced lock
I developed 2 solutions for this problem. I was also looking for an easy way of doing this without using any libraries and a lot of code.
My solutions are based on: https://stackoverflow.com/a/46705579/10686802 which I have improved upon. Therefore I would like to thank #akshaya pandey and #rbento
Simple file lock
package YOUR_PACKAGE_NAME;
import java.io.File;
import java.io.IOException;
/**
* Minimal reproducible example (MRE) - Example of a simple lock file.
* #author Remzi Cavdar - ict#remzi.info - #Remzi1993
*/
public class Main {
public static void main(String[] args) {
/*
* Prevents the user of starting multiple instances of the application.
* This is done by creating a temporary file in the app directory.
* The temp file should be excluded from git and is called App.lock in this example.
*/
final File FILE = new File("App.lock");
try {
if (FILE.createNewFile()) {
System.out.println("Starting application");
} else {
System.err.println("The application is already running!");
return;
}
} catch (IOException e) {
throw new RuntimeException(e);
}
/*
* Register a shutdown hook to delete the lock file when the application is closed. Even when forcefully closed
* with the task manager. (Tested on Windows 11 with JavaFX 19)
*/
FILE.deleteOnExit();
// Whatever your app is supposed to do
}
}
Advanced lock
package YOUR_PACKAGE_NAME;
import java.io.File;
import java.io.FileNotFoundException;
import java.io.FileOutputStream;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.nio.channels.FileChannel;
import java.nio.channels.FileLock;
/**
* Minimal reproducible example (MRE) - Example of a more advanced lock system.
* #author Remzi Cavdar - ict#remzi.info - #Remzi1993
*/
public class Main {
public static void main(String[] args) {
/*
* Prevents the user of starting multiple instances of the application.
* This is done by creating a temporary file in the app directory.
* The temp file should be excluded from git and is called App.lock in this example.
*/
final File FILE = new File("App.lock");
if (FILE.exists()) {
System.err.println("The application is already running!");
return;
}
try (
FileOutputStream fileOutputStream = new FileOutputStream(FILE);
FileChannel channel = fileOutputStream.getChannel();
FileLock lock = channel.lock()
) {
System.out.println("Starting application");
} catch (FileNotFoundException e) {
throw new RuntimeException(e);
} catch (IOException e) {
throw new RuntimeException(e);
}
/*
* Register a shutdown hook to delete the lock file when the application is closed. Even when forcefully closed
* with the task manager. (Tested on Windows 11 with JavaFX 19)
*/
FILE.deleteOnExit();
// Whatever your app is supposed to do
}
}
Testing
Tested on: 31-10-2022
Tested OS: Windows 11 - Version 21H2 (OS Build 22000.1098)
Tested with: OpenJDK 19 - Eclipse Temurin JDK with Hotspot 19+36(x64)
I closed the application and also forcefully closed the application with task manager on Windows both times the lock file seems to be deleted upon (force) close.
I struggled with this same problem for a while... none of the ideas presented here worked for me. In all cases, the lock (file, socket or otherwise) did not persist into the 2nd process instance, so the 2nd instance still ran.
So I decided to try an old school approach to simply crate a .pid file with the process id of the first process. Then any 2nd process would quit if it finds the .pid file, and also the process number specified in the file is confirmed to be still running. This approach worked for me.
There is a fair bit of code, which I provide here in full for your use... a complete solution.
package common.environment;
import org.apache.logging.log4j.LogManager;
import org.apache.logging.log4j.Logger;
import javax.annotation.Nonnull;
import javax.annotation.Nullable;
import java.io.*;
import java.nio.charset.Charset;
public class SingleAppInstance
{
private static final #Nonnull Logger log = LogManager.getLogger(SingleAppInstance.class.getName());
/**
* Enforces that only a single instance of the given component is running. This
* is resilient to crashes, unexpected reboots and other forceful termination
* scenarios.
*
* #param componentName = Name of this component, for disambiguation with other
* components that may run simultaneously with this one.
* #return = true if the program is the only instance and is allowed to run.
*/
public static boolean isOnlyInstanceOf(#Nonnull String componentName)
{
boolean result = false;
// Make sure the directory exists
String dirPath = getHomePath();
try
{
FileUtil.createDirectories(dirPath);
}
catch (IOException e)
{
throw new RuntimeException(String.format("Unable to create directory: [%s]", dirPath));
}
File pidFile = new File(dirPath, componentName + ".pid");
// Try to read a prior, existing pid from the pid file. Returns null if the file doesn't exist.
String oldPid = FileUtil.readFile(pidFile);
// See if such a process is running.
if (oldPid != null && ProcessChecker.isStillAllive(oldPid))
{
log.error(String.format("An instance of %s is already running", componentName));
}
// If that process isn't running, create a new lock file for the current process.
else
{
// Write current pid to the file.
long thisPid = ProcessHandle.current().pid();
FileUtil.createFile(pidFile.getAbsolutePath(), String.valueOf(thisPid));
// Try to be tidy. Note: This won't happen on exit if forcibly terminated, so we don't depend on it.
pidFile.deleteOnExit();
result = true;
}
return result;
}
public static #Nonnull String getHomePath()
{
// Returns a path like C:/Users/Person/
return System.getProperty("user.home") + "/";
}
}
class ProcessChecker
{
private static final #Nonnull Logger log = LogManager.getLogger(io.cpucoin.core.platform.ProcessChecker.class.getName());
static boolean isStillAllive(#Nonnull String pidStr)
{
String OS = System.getProperty("os.name").toLowerCase();
String command;
if (OS.contains("win"))
{
log.debug("Check alive Windows mode. Pid: [{}]", pidStr);
command = "cmd /c tasklist /FI \"PID eq " + pidStr + "\"";
}
else if (OS.contains("nix") || OS.contains("nux"))
{
log.debug("Check alive Linux/Unix mode. Pid: [{}]", pidStr);
command = "ps -p " + pidStr;
}
else
{
log.warn("Unsupported OS: Check alive for Pid: [{}] return false", pidStr);
return false;
}
return isProcessIdRunning(pidStr, command); // call generic implementation
}
private static boolean isProcessIdRunning(#Nonnull String pid, #Nonnull String command)
{
log.debug("Command [{}]", command);
try
{
Runtime rt = Runtime.getRuntime();
Process pr = rt.exec(command);
InputStreamReader isReader = new InputStreamReader(pr.getInputStream());
BufferedReader bReader = new BufferedReader(isReader);
String strLine;
while ((strLine = bReader.readLine()) != null)
{
if (strLine.contains(" " + pid + " "))
{
return true;
}
}
return false;
}
catch (Exception ex)
{
log.warn("Got exception using system command [{}].", command, ex);
return true;
}
}
}
class FileUtil
{
static void createDirectories(#Nonnull String dirPath) throws IOException
{
File dir = new File(dirPath);
if (dir.mkdirs()) /* If false, directories already exist so nothing to do. */
{
if (!dir.exists())
{
throw new IOException(String.format("Failed to create directory (access permissions problem?): [%s]", dirPath));
}
}
}
static void createFile(#Nonnull String fullPathToFile, #Nonnull String contents)
{
try (PrintWriter writer = new PrintWriter(fullPathToFile, Charset.defaultCharset()))
{
writer.print(contents);
}
catch (IOException e)
{
throw new RuntimeException(String.format("Unable to create file at %s! %s", fullPathToFile, e.getMessage()), e);
}
}
static #Nullable String readFile(#Nonnull File file)
{
try
{
try (BufferedReader fileReader = new BufferedReader(new FileReader(file)))
{
StringBuilder result = new StringBuilder();
String line;
while ((line = fileReader.readLine()) != null)
{
result.append(line);
if (fileReader.ready())
result.append("\n");
}
return result.toString();
}
}
catch (IOException e)
{
return null;
}
}
}
To use it, simply invoke it like this:
if (!SingleAppInstance.isOnlyInstanceOf("my-component"))
{
// quit
}
I hope you find this helpful.
Finally I found really simple library to achieve this. You can you use JUniqe.
The JUnique library can be used to prevent a user to run at the same
time more instances of the same Java application.
This is an example how to use it from the documentation
public static void main(String[] args) {
String appId = "myapplicationid";
boolean alreadyRunning;
try {
JUnique.acquireLock(appId);
alreadyRunning = false;
} catch (AlreadyLockedException e) {
alreadyRunning = true;
}
if (!alreadyRunning) {
// Start sequence here
}
}
here is a pretty rudimental approach.
If your application is launched from a script, check the running java/javaw processes and their command line before launch
In windows
REM check if there is a javaw process running your.main.class
REM if found, go to the end of the script and skip the launch of a new instance
WMIC path win32_process WHERE "Name='javaw.exe'" get CommandLine 2>nul | findstr your.main.class >nul 2>&1
if %ERRORLEVEL% EQU 0 goto:eof
javaw your.main.class