Node has a built-in library called child_process that allows us to execute shell commands using either the child_process.exec() function or the child_process.spawn() function.
In this section, you will learn how to execute shell commands using the exec() function in Node's child_process library.
In this example, we will execute the coffee command with the --help parameter to get the help text displayed by the CoffeeScript executable:
Load the
child_processlibrary and grab itsexec()function:exec = require('child_process').execExecute CoffeeScript's
coffee --helpcommand, which will display the help text for CoffeeScript:exec 'coffee -help', (error, stdout, stderr) ->The following result will be displayed:
if stdout console.log "Received #{stdout.length} bytes." console.log stdout if stderr console.error stderr