Open document with default OS application in Python, both in Windows and Mac OS

python windows macos
Abdullah Jibaly picture Abdullah Jibaly · Jan 12, 2009 · Viewed 94.2k times · Source

I need to be able to open a document using its default application in Windows and Mac OS. Basically, I want to do the same thing that happens when you double-click on the document icon in Explorer or Finder. What is the best way to do this in Python?

Answer

Nick picture Nick · Jan 12, 2009

Use the subprocess module available on Python 2.4+, not os.system(), so you don't have to deal with shell escaping.

import subprocess, os, platform
if platform.system() == 'Darwin':       # macOS
    subprocess.call(('open', filepath))
elif platform.system() == 'Windows':    # Windows
    os.startfile(filepath)
else:                                   # linux variants
    subprocess.call(('xdg-open', filepath))

The double parentheses are because subprocess.call() wants a sequence as its first argument, so we're using a tuple here. On Linux systems with Gnome there is also a gnome-open command that does the same thing, but xdg-open is the Free Desktop Foundation standard and works across Linux desktop environments.

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