call script from django unittest

Question

I'm trying to run a script from a django unit test but failing to do so.

The script I want to call can be run from the command line with python -m webapp.lib.cron.my_cron

I've tried:

from subprocess import call
call("python -m webapp.lib.cron.my_cron")

and receive the following error:

FileNotFoundError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: 'python -m webapp.lib.cron.my_cron'

How can I run this script in a django unittest?

Answer 1

You should pass the arguments as a list, not a string.

import subprocess
subprocess.call(["python",  "-m", "webapp.lib.cron.my_cron"])

Answer 2

use Popen because subprocess.Popen is more general than subprocess.call.

import subprocess
subprocess.Popen(["python",  "-m", "webapp.lib.cron.my_cron"])