'Symfony process run throws exception - executing on command line works

I have an issue with generating PDF files using LaTeX. The solution is created with the Laravel framework (version 8).

I installed a new "Windows 2019 Datacenter" server, where the website should later be hosted on. On the server the command to generate the PDF files fails. On my local developing machine (Windows 10) the command works fine. I'm running on both machines PHP 7.4 with symfony/process v5.0.

This is the code where the command is being created:

public function createPDFFromLaTexFile(string $fileName, string $outputDirectory, string $laTexFilePath) {
    $executionFile = str_replace('/','\\',env('PDFLATEXENGINE', 'C:/Program Files (x86)/MiKTeX 2.9/miktex/bin/pdflatex.exe'));
    $execute = [$executionFile, '-jobname=' .str_replace('.pdf','',$fileName), '-output-directory=' .str_replace("\\", "/", $outputDirectory), str_replace("\\", "/", str_replace(".tex","",$laTexFilePath))];
    $this->executeProcess($execute);
}

public function executeProcess($executionProcess) {
    $process = new \Symfony\Component\Process\Process($executionProcess);
    $process->run();
    if (!$process->isSuccessful()) {
        throw new \Symfony\Component\Process\Exception\ProcessFailedException($process);
    }
}

This is what the error log says:

[2020-11-16 06:13:55] Live.ERROR: The command "C:_Tools\texlive\2020\bin\win32\pdflatex.exe -jobname=m7EkMDQFggshi4gGpsDD "-output-directory=C:/_App/Live/public/Berichte/" "C:/_App/Live/app/Classes/Bericht/Tex/Working/m7EkMDQFggshi4gGpsDD"" failed.

Exit Code: 1(General error)

Working directory: C:_App\Live\public

Output: == ==============

Error Output:

================ {"userId":1770,"exception":"[object] (Symfony\Component\Process\Exception\ProcessFailedException(code: 0): The command "C:\_Tools\texlive\2020\bin\win32\pdflatex.exe -jobname=m7EkMDQFggshi4gGpsDD "-output-directory=C:/_App/Live/public/Berichte/" "C:/_App/Live/app/Classes/Bericht/Tex/Working/m7EkMDQFggshi4gGpsDD"" failed.

Exit Code: 1(General error)

Working directory: C:\_App\Live\public

Output: == ==============

Error Output:

================ at C:\_App\Live\app\Classes\Documents\PDF.php:21) [stacktrace] #0 C:\_App\Live\app\Classes\Documents\PDF.php(13): App\Classes\Documents\PDF->executeProcess() #1 C:\_App\Live\app\Classes\Bericht\Bericht.php(239): App\Classes\Documents\PDF->createPDFFromLaTexFile() #2 C:\_App\Live\app\Http\Controllers\Bericht\BerichtController.php(51): App\Classes\Bericht\Bericht->pdfErzeugen() #3 [internal function]: App\Http\Controllers\Bericht\BerichtController->erzeugen() ...

The strange thing is, if I run the command in the command window itself, all works fine and the PDF is created successfully.

I'm not sure, why the first parameter is not enclosed by ". Maybe this could be the reason why the command fails? Or could it be a authorization issue to run the command?

"C:\_Tools\texlive\2020\bin\win32\pdflatex.exe -jobname=m7EkMDQFggshi4gGpsDD "-output-directory=C:/_App/Live/public/Berichte/" "C:/_App/Live/app/Classes/Bericht/Tex/Working/m7EkMDQFggshi4gGpsDD""

Update

If tried to create the file using the PHP proc_open() command, using this code:

$command = '';
$count = 0;
foreach ($executionProcess as $value) {
    if($count != 0) {
        $command .= " ";
    }
    $command .= '"' .$value .'"';
    $count++;
}
$command .= " > nul";
\Log::info('Command: ' .$command);
$descriptorspec = array(
    0 => array("pipe", "r"),  
    1 => array("pipe", "w"), 
    2 => array("file", env('PROCOPENERRORLOG') ."procOpenErrors.log", "a")
);
$cwd = str_replace("\\", "/", base_path()) .'/app/Classes/Bericht/Tex/Working';
$env = null;
$process = proc_open($command, $descriptorspec, $pipes, $cwd, $env);
if (is_resource($process)) {
    fwrite($pipes[0], '<?php print_r($_ENV); ?>');
    fclose($pipes[0]);
    echo stream_get_contents($pipes[1]);
    fclose($pipes[1]);
    $return_value = proc_close($process);
}

Again I get the same behaviour. If run the command in $command variable in the command window manually, the PDF is being generated. But when I just run the code, the PDF file is not being generated.

So far I can say, the command itself is correct. Maybe it is really an issue of permissions on the server system? Another idea I had, if it could be an issue of using PHP 7.4 32-bit or 64-bit? Currently is installed the x64 version of PHP 7.4.

phplaravelpdflatexlaravel-8symfony-process


Solution 1:[1]

Unfortunately I was not able to find out why Symfony process has a problem with the generation of the PDF file, but I found a workaround. I was able to get my proc_open command to work. This is the code that works now:

$command = '';
$count = 0;
foreach ($executionProcess as $value) {
    if($count != 0) {
        // parameters quoted:
        $command .= " ";
        $command .= '"' .$value .'"';
    }
    else {
        // exe
        $command .= $value;
    }
    $count++;
}
$command .= " > nul";
\Log::info('Command: ' .$command);
$descriptorspec = array(
    0 => array("pipe", "r"),  
    1 => array("pipe", "w"), 
    2 => array("file", env('PROCOPENERRORLOG') ."procOpenErrors.log", "a")
);
$cwd = str_replace("\\", "/", base_path()) .'/app/Classes/Bericht/Tex/Working';
$env = null;
$process = proc_open($command, $descriptorspec, $pipes, $cwd, $env);
if (is_resource($process)) {
    fwrite($pipes[0], '<?php print_r($_ENV); ?>');
    fclose($pipes[0]);
    echo stream_get_contents($pipes[1]);
    fclose($pipes[1]);
    $return_value = proc_close($process);
}

But I am still interested, why Symfony is not working.

Sources

This article follows the attribution requirements of Stack Overflow and is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.

Source: Stack Overflow

Solution Source
Solution 1

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