How to execute python scripts from react-js?

Question

I have a use case where I need to execute a local python script from the browser and display the output returned.

I have written my web app using react-js.

My current solution is to launch a local instance of a jupyter notebook (assuming the client is already running it) and make the user execute the prefilled first cell, but I want to be able to do this directly from the browser.

Answer 1

web pages cannot run arbitrary OS commands (such as executing a python scripts) from the browser - due to security reasons

a server has to provide an API for the web page to call (note that Jupyter Notebook is using it's own server to execute commands specified in a browser - python code is NOT executed directly in the browser)

there are many ways how to start a python web server, I personally recommend Flask: http://flask.pocoo.org/

Answer 2

If you wish to program in Python but have the code execute in browser, you need either:

A) to run some kind of python program on client machine (separate from browser) which would listen and allow browser to connect to it using some kind of Api (Rest etc);

Or B) transpile your Python to client side Javascript which you inject into the web page client views. There are several tools that support it, such as https://www.transcrypt.org or http://pyjs.org

Or C) use libraries which allow client side Python in browser, such as http://www.skulpt.org (basically similar to B) but does it transparently)