Best way to wrap rsync progress in a gui? - windows

Question

I use rsync to synchronize files to Windows clients in a server agnostic way. What methods are available to send the progress of rsync to the parent process for display in a gui progress bar?
I imagine two or three choices exist. (1) Watch STDOUT (2) Watch rsync.exe log file, similar to unix tail (3) Watch rsync console output in memory.
Which one is best/preferred?

Answer 1

For this type of tasks, I use my own AutoIt script (freeware, Windows only). The script redirects the standard output into a graphical window, displaying it with the ability to scroll back, etc (very useful in long processes like XCOPYs / PKZIPs to check if any error did happen).
I use AutoIt because it's free, very easy to use, and can compile quickly into an .EXE. I think it's an excellent alternative to a complete programming language for this type of tasks. The downside is that it's for Windows only.
$sCmd = "DIR E:\*.AU3 /S" ; Test command
$nAutoTimeout = 10 ; Time in seconds to close window after finish
$nDeskPct = 60 ; % of desktop size (if percent)
; $nHeight = 480 ; height/width of the main window (if fixed)
; $nWidth = 480
$sTitRun = "Executing process. Wait...." ;
$sTitDone = "Process done" ;
$sSound = #WindowsDir & "\Media\Ding.wav" ; End Sound
$sButRun = "Cancel" ; Caption of "Exec" button
$sButDone = "Close" ; Caption of "Close" button
#include <GUIConstants.au3>
#include <Constants.au3>
#Include <GuiList.au3>
Opt("GUIOnEventMode", 1)
if $nDeskPct > 0 Then
$nHeight = #DesktopHeight * ($nDeskPct / 100)
$nWidth = #DesktopWidth * ($nDeskPct / 100)
EndIf
If $CmdLine[0] > 0 Then
$sCmd = ""
For $nCmd = 1 To $CmdLine[0]
$sCmd = $sCmd & " " & $CmdLine[$nCmd]
Next
; MsgBox (1,"",$sCmd)
EndIf
; AutoItSetOption("GUIDataSeparatorChar", Chr(13)+Chr(10))
$nForm = GUICreate($sTitRun, $nWidth, $nHeight)
GUISetOnEvent($GUI_EVENT_CLOSE, "CloseForm")
$nList = GUICtrlCreateList ("", 10, 10, $nWidth - 20, $nHeight - 50, $WS_BORDER + $WS_VSCROLL)
GUICtrlSetFont (-1, 9, 0, 0, "Courier New")
$nClose = GUICtrlCreateButton ($sButRun, $nWidth - 100, $nHeight - 40, 80, 30)
GUICtrlSetOnEvent (-1, "CloseForm")
GUISetState(#SW_SHOW) ;, $nForm)
$nPID = Run(#ComSpec & " /C " & $sCmd, ".", #SW_HIDE, $STDOUT_CHILD)
; $nPID = Run(#ComSpec & " /C _RunErrl.bat " & $sCmd, ".", #SW_HIDE, $STDOUT_CHILD) ; # Con ésto devuelve el errorlevel en _ERRL.TMP
While 1
$sLine = StdoutRead($nPID)
If #error Then ExitLoop
If StringLen ($sLine) > 0 then
$sLine = StringReplace ($sLine, Chr(13), "|")
$sLine = StringReplace ($sLine, Chr(10), "")
if StringLeft($sLine, 1)="|" Then
$sLine = " " & $sLine
endif
GUICtrlSetData ($nList, $sLine)
_GUICtrlListSelectIndex ($nList, _GUICtrlListCount ($nList) - 1)
EndIf
Wend
$sLine = " ||"
GUICtrlSetData ($nList, $sLine)
_GUICtrlListSelectIndex ($nList, _GUICtrlListCount ($nList) - 1)
GUICtrlSetData ($nClose, $sButDone)
WinSetTitle ($sTitRun, "", $sTitDone)
If $sSound <> "" Then
SoundPlay ($sSound)
EndIf
$rInfo = DllStructCreate("uint;dword") ; # LASTINPUTINFO
DllStructSetData($rInfo, 1, DllStructGetSize($rInfo));
DllCall("user32.dll", "int", "GetLastInputInfo", "ptr", DllStructGetPtr($rInfo))
$nLastInput = DllStructGetData($rInfo, 2)
$nTime = TimerInit()
While 1
If $nAutoTimeout > 0 Then
DllCall("user32.dll", "int", "GetLastInputInfo", "ptr", DllStructGetPtr($rInfo))
If DllStructGetData($rInfo, 2) <> $nLastInput Then
; Tocó una tecla
$nAutoTimeout = 0
EndIf
EndIf
If $nAutoTimeout > 0 And TimerDiff ($nTime) > $nAutoTimeOut * 1000 Then
ExitLoop
EndIf
Sleep (100)
Wend
Func CloseForm()
Exit
EndFunc

Answer 2

.NET has a pretty straight forward way to read and watch STDOUT.
I guess this would be the cleanest way, since it is not dependent on any external files, just the path to rsync. I would not be too surprised if there is a wrapper library out there either. If not, write and open source it :)

Answer 3

I've built my own simple object for this, I get a lot of reuse out of it, I can wrap it with a cmdline, web page, webservice, write output to a file, etc---
The commented items contain some rsync examples--
what I'd like to do sometime is embed rsync (and cygwin) into a resource & make a single .net executable out of it--
Here you go:
Imports System.IO
Namespace cds
Public Class proc
Public _cmdString As String
Public _workingDir As String
Public _arg As String
Public Function basic() As String
Dim sOut As String = ""
Try
'Set start information.
'Dim startinfo As New ProcessStartInfo("C:\Program Files\cwRsync\bin\rsync", "-avzrbP 192.168.42.6::cdsERP /cygdrive/s/cdsERP_rsync/gwy")
'Dim startinfo As New ProcessStartInfo("C:\Program Files\cwRsync\bin\rsync", "-avzrbP 10.1.1.6::user /cygdrive/s/cdsERP_rsync/gws/user")
'Dim startinfo As New ProcessStartInfo("C:\windows\system32\cscript", "//NoLogo c:\windows\system32\prnmngr.vbs -l")
Dim si As New ProcessStartInfo(_cmdString, _arg)
si.UseShellExecute = False
si.CreateNoWindow = True
si.RedirectStandardOutput = True
si.RedirectStandardError = True
si.WorkingDirectory = _workingDir
' Make the process and set its start information.
Dim p As New Process()
p.StartInfo = si
' Start the process.
p.Start()
' Attach to stdout and stderr.
Dim stdout As StreamReader = p.StandardOutput()
Dim stderr As StreamReader = p.StandardError()
sOut = stdout.ReadToEnd() & ControlChars.NewLine & stderr.ReadToEnd()
'Dim writer As New StreamWriter("out.txt", FileMode.CreateNew)
'writer.Write(sOut)
'writer.Close()
stdout.Close()
stderr.Close()
p.Close()
Catch ex As Exception
sOut = ex.Message
End Try
Return sOut
End Function
End Class
End Namespace

Answer 4

Check out DeltaCopy. It is a Windows GUI for rsync.

Answer 5

Check NAsBackup Its open source software that give Windows user Rsync GUI using Watch STDOUT.