Re: [LUG] Process refuses to run in background

[Jonathan Melhuish <lists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Simon Waters wrote:

> Jonathan Melhuish wrote:
>  
>
> > I'm trying to get a user-space program, Mutella, to run in the background.
> >
> > *  "nohup mutella &" - mutella exits silently, it just says "stopped"
> > *  "nohup mutella" - it just sits there, but mutella doesn't run
> >
> > Okay, so maybe this is a Mutella-specific problem, in which case you
> > probably can't help me, but i was under the impression that any program
> > that you can run in the foreground can be run in the background?
> >    
>
> Nope - you can't background processes that expect keyboard input.
>
> Usually they stop when they attempt to access the TTY, and issue an
> appropriate error (which you might be missing?).
>  
It doesn't seem to output any error in nohup.out, although your 
diagnosis seems logical.

> What happens if you foreground the process i.e. "jobs" "fg %n" where n
> is the relevant job - and sometimes a "ctrl-L" is useful to redraw the
> screen.
>  
Erm, no, when I try to run it in the background it dies instantly.

> These days you can use "screen" to leave such processes running, and
> resume connection when and from where you like, but if they stop
> expecting input, it probably won't have done much in the interim.
>  
# apt-get install screen
# man screen
# screen -d -m mutella
# logout

Ooh!  I think you've cracked it!  Thanks! :-)

Cheers,

Jon


--
The Mailing List for the Devon & Cornwall LUG
Mail majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxx with "unsubscribe list" in the
message body to unsubscribe.