run a shell script from a beamer-generated pdf

[Rosie80]

Hi,
I'm trying to run a shell script from a latex-generated pdf file.
In the latex code, I use
\href{run:shell.sh}{here}
I include the hyperref package
but when I click on the hyperref within the generated pdf file, I open the shell script in a text editor instead of executing it.
Does anybody knows what I am doing wrong?

On Monday, 31. August 2009 02:46:28 Rosie80 wrote:
> Hi,
> I'm trying to run a shell script from a latex-generated pdf file.
> In the latex code, I use
> \href{run:shell.sh}{here}
> I include the hyperref package
> but when I click on the hyperref within the generated pdf file, I open the
> shell script in a text editor instead of executing it.
> Does anybody knows what I am doing wrong?

Hi Rosie,

I would expect the script to work just the way you found in the other thread.
However, you could have included the quote in this message also and thus avoid
thread-hijacking. But nevertheless, my first idea would be, is the script
executable?
As always, some miniexample might be helpful to better understand your
situtation.

Best,

Cedric

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[Steve Schwartz-2]

Rosie,

On Mon, 2009-08-31 at 01:46 +0100, Rosie80 wrote:
> Hi,
> I'm trying to run a shell script from a latex-generated pdf file.
> In the latex code, I use
> \href{run:shell.sh}{here}
> I include the hyperref package
> but when I click on the hyperref within the generated pdf file, I open the
> shell script in a text editor instead of executing it.
> Does anybody knows what I am doing wrong?

I think this is probably because your acroreader, or whatever, doesn't
know what you want it to do. Here are some notes I made for myself a
while back, which involve adding things to mailcap and mimetype. Be
warned, however. Opening up your pdf reader to execute arbitrary shell
scripts could be dangerous is someone sends you a rogue pdf which
invokes a script to wipe your hard-disk!

Hope this helps.
Steve

-------------------------------
Some time ago I posted a query concerning launching a script to run a
movie from a pdf file created by pdflatex (e.g., using beamer to make a
presentation). Here's my original posting:

http://www.tug.org/pipermail/texhax/2005-September/004624.html

Many people have written to me asking if I had found a solution, to
which my reply was no. Then Achim Beetz did the same thing and, a couple
of hours later, sent me the (partial) solution from which I put together
the final bits. What follows is how it's done in Linux.

It's all a question of mimetypes that acroread knows how to handle
which, of course, it gets from the system, e.g., /etc/mailcap,
~/.mailcap, etc. In addition (which Achim didn't tell me), you need to
teach your system about the file extensions, in ~/.mime.types, so it can
then go look up the appropriate application.

In your latex source there is, for example:

\href{run:movie_script.sh}{Click Here}

movie_script.sh is just a shell script to run your favorite player, e.g.
a file with the one line:

mplayer -geometry 50%:50% -nofs  /home/sjs/movies/mymovie.mpg

(xine also works pretty well; you need something with a good command
line interface and which gives you control, e.g., to hide the controls,
etc.).

Then you need:

In ~/.mailcap:
application/x-sh; /bin/sh %s

to invoke sh to run your shell script. You can also use /bin/bash or
some
other shell interpreter. You also need to associate the .sh
ending with a shellscript:

In ~/.mime.types:
application/x-sh sh

That's it! In putting together the final pieces following Achim's help,
I
ran across postings that discouraged putting application/x-sh
in your .mailcap. I presume this is because your browser will also pick
up this information and if a web-page has a similar href link to a shell
script, it will run it without prompting on your machine! Of course, it
has to first put a suitably evil shellscript somewhere it can find and
then
execute it. But I can see the dangers. I guess there might be a way to
modify the acroread script so that only acroread finds this .mailcap
entry. Suggestions from gurus most welcome. Perhaps using your own
special
filename ending and only putting that in .mime.types would be
sufficient,
or more tediously simply editing/swapping multiple versions of .mailcap
files.

Finally, as Achim pointed out, you can do the same thing directly on the
movie file, by specifying, e.g.,

In ~/.mailcap:
video/*; mplayer [options] %s

You will obviously need to teach .mime.types about suffices for video
files.
Then you can run the movie directly:

\href{run:mymovie.mpg}{Click Here}

This is another way to avoid the security risk of opening up /bin/sh, at
the
expense of not being able to control the movie geometry, repitition, or
other parameters you might put on the command line. Perhaps these could
all
be coerced into the "filename" passes through %s?



--
+-------------------------------------------------------------------+
Professor Steven J Schwartz        Phone: [phone]
Head, Space & Atmospheric Physics  Fax:   [phone]
The Blackett Laboratory            E-mail: s.schwartz@...
Imperial College London            Office: Huxley 711A
London SW7 2AZ, U.K.               Web: www.sp.ph.ic.ac.uk/~sjs
+-------------------------------------------------------------------+



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[Rosie80]

Thank you for your answers.
The problem was that my OS opens all the .sh files with a text editor.
I changed that into the file properties and,now, the link is working.


Rosilde

Steve Schwartz-2 wrote:

Rosie,

On Mon, 2009-08-31 at 01:46 +0100, Rosie80 wrote:
> Hi,
> I'm trying to run a shell script from a latex-generated pdf file.
> In the latex code, I use
> \href{run:shell.sh}{here}
> I include the hyperref package
> but when I click on the hyperref within the generated pdf file, I open the
> shell script in a text editor instead of executing it.
> Does anybody knows what I am doing wrong?

I think this is probably because your acroreader, or whatever, doesn't
know what you want it to do. Here are some notes I made for myself a
while back, which involve adding things to mailcap and mimetype. Be
warned, however. Opening up your pdf reader to execute arbitrary shell
scripts could be dangerous is someone sends you a rogue pdf which
invokes a script to wipe your hard-disk!

Hope this helps.
Steve

-------------------------------
Some time ago I posted a query concerning launching a script to run a
movie from a pdf file created by pdflatex (e.g., using beamer to make a
presentation). Here's my original posting:

http://www.tug.org/pipermail/texhax/2005-September/004624.html

Many people have written to me asking if I had found a solution, to
which my reply was no. Then Achim Beetz did the same thing and, a couple
of hours later, sent me the (partial) solution from which I put together
the final bits. What follows is how it's done in Linux.

It's all a question of mimetypes that acroread knows how to handle
which, of course, it gets from the system, e.g., /etc/mailcap,
~/.mailcap, etc. In addition (which Achim didn't tell me), you need to
teach your system about the file extensions, in ~/.mime.types, so it can
then go look up the appropriate application.

In your latex source there is, for example:

\href{run:movie_script.sh}{Click Here}

movie_script.sh is just a shell script to run your favorite player, e.g.
a file with the one line:

mplayer -geometry 50%:50% -nofs  /home/sjs/movies/mymovie.mpg

(xine also works pretty well; you need something with a good command
line interface and which gives you control, e.g., to hide the controls,
etc.).

Then you need:

In ~/.mailcap:
application/x-sh; /bin/sh %s

to invoke sh to run your shell script. You can also use /bin/bash or
some
other shell interpreter. You also need to associate the .sh
ending with a shellscript:

In ~/.mime.types:
application/x-sh sh

That's it! In putting together the final pieces following Achim's help,
I
ran across postings that discouraged putting application/x-sh
in your .mailcap. I presume this is because your browser will also pick
up this information and if a web-page has a similar href link to a shell
script, it will run it without prompting on your machine! Of course, it
has to first put a suitably evil shellscript somewhere it can find and
then
execute it. But I can see the dangers. I guess there might be a way to
modify the acroread script so that only acroread finds this .mailcap
entry. Suggestions from gurus most welcome. Perhaps using your own
special
filename ending and only putting that in .mime.types would be
sufficient,
or more tediously simply editing/swapping multiple versions of .mailcap
files.

Finally, as Achim pointed out, you can do the same thing directly on the
movie file, by specifying, e.g.,

In ~/.mailcap:
video/*; mplayer [options] %s

You will obviously need to teach .mime.types about suffices for video
files.
Then you can run the movie directly:

\href{run:mymovie.mpg}{Click Here}

This is another way to avoid the security risk of opening up /bin/sh, at
the
expense of not being able to control the movie geometry, repitition, or
other parameters you might put on the command line. Perhaps these could
all
be coerced into the "filename" passes through %s?



--
+-------------------------------------------------------------------+
Professor Steven J Schwartz        Phone: [phone]
Head, Space & Atmospheric Physics  Fax:   [phone]
The Blackett Laboratory            E-mail: [e-mail]
Imperial College London            Office: Huxley 711A
London SW7 2AZ, U.K.               Web: www.sp.ph.ic.ac.uk/~sjs
+-------------------------------------------------------------------+



------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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trial. Simplify your report design, integration and deployment - and focus on
what you do best, core application coding. Discover what's new with
Crystal Reports now.  http://p.sf.net/sfu/bobj-july
_______________________________________________
Latex-beamer-users mailing list
[e-mail]
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[g.a.]

Thank you for your answers.
The problem was that my OS opens all the .sh files with a text editor.
I changed that into the file properties and,now, the link is working.


Hello,

I have the same problem, followed all the instructions and still can not play the video from acrobat.

Could you please tell me how exactly did you change the file properties, I simply put as empty the "open with" field and now I got an error message that no application is associated with the sh file.

This is what I did:

- created both ~/.mailcap and ~/.mime.types
- created the movie.sh with executable properties (I can run it from shell correctly)
- add the line in the latex source:

\href{run:movie.sh}{\includegraphics[width=66mm]{myimage.eps}}

my .mailcap file has one line:

application/x-shellscript;/bin/bash %s

my .mime.types also has one line:

application/x-sh sh

Thanks in advance,
gianluca