Using cmd line under django server

Question

To make it easier to understand, i will use simple command line as 'ls'

How can i use a command line like 'pwd' or 'ls' into a django server ?

For example, my django server is running 'python manage.py runserver'

And into my code i would like to run a cmd command like 'pwd' and get the output of this command :

@login_required
def history(request):
 list_file = print('ls') #i would like to do 'ls' command
 return render(request, 'history.html')

Is it possible ?

Thank for your help !

• willeM_ Van Onsem: You can use subprocess.run (docs.python.org/3/library/subprocess.html#subprocess.run) but beware that this is a security vulnerability. If you give shell access (to some extent), people can try to take over the server.
• Valentin Garreau: Ok thank you, that work.
• Valentin Garreau: Can you answer the question with your current answer please? I'll mark it as answered :)
• willeM_ Van Onsem: answered the question :).

Answer 1

You can make use of subprocess module [python-doc], for example subprocess.run(...) [python-doc].

from subprocess import run, PIPE
@login_required
def history(request):
 result = run('ls', stdout=PIPE)
 response = result.stdout
 return render(request, 'history.html', {'response': response})

You should however be careful not to give shell access to users. If you allow users to run arbitrary commands, they can take over the server, for example by replacing the Django code with some other code, etc. Although commands like ls are (to some extent) innocent, it is easy to exploit a certain feature of a command to gain access.