Ubuntu – Prevent an application from being closed on terminal exit

10.10bashcommand linenohup

I have created a bash script that starts an application. Since I wanted the terminal window to close when the application is started, I used this line:

firefox & 2> /dev/null; exit;

It works fine as long as I start the script from the command line. However, if I start it from a desktop laucher the application closes as well as the terminal. Can anyone explain why this is. Im using Ubuntu 10.10.

By only using:

    nohup firefox

it works. But I still would like an explanation to why the original version doesn't work when started from a desktop launcher, if possible.

Best Answer

The solution is to simply use the right form in the pipe:

firefox > /dev/null 2>&1
exit

This works both from terminal and from a desktop launcher. No need to use nohup.

Related Solutions

Ubuntu – How to run commands from a bash file the way they run from terminal

Consider this script (saved as /home/muru/test.sh):

#! /bin/bash
DRI_PRIME=1 glxgears -info

A basic launcher for this would look like (say, save it as /home/muru/test.desktop):

[Desktop Entry]
Type=Application
Terminal=true
Name=glx-gears-info
Exec=/home/muru/test.sh

Make them both executable:

chmod +x test.sh test.desktop

Now you should have these two entries in your home folder: enter image description here

Notice how the name is glx-gears-info even though the launcher's filename is test.desktop. You can double click on it to start the script: enter image description here

For a script like (say, located at /home/muru/start-aria.sh):

#!/bin/bash
touch /home/cip/Downloads/aria2/session.txt && \
    aria2c --enable-rpc --rpc-listen-all \
       --save-session=/home/cip/Downloads/aria2/session.txt \
       --input-file=/home/cip/Downloads/aria2/session.txt -x16 -s16 -k1M \
       --dir=/home/cip/Downloads/aria2

(I split the command into multiple lines for readability) the launcher file would look like (say /home/muru/start-aria.desktop):

[Desktop Entry]
Type=Application
Terminal=false
Name=Start Aria2
Exec=/home/muru/start-aria.sh

You can set Terminal=false here as this command probably doesn't need a terminal.

To get the terminal window when using Xfce launchers, tick 'Run in Terminal'.

enter image description here

A second command, that would close aria2, can be added in the same Xfce launcher: pkill aria2c

Also:

by adding them into a single launcher,
setting advanced properties like in the image below

enter image description here

(namely 'show last used item' and 'inside button'),

and adding two specific icons,

the launcher will always display the current status of aria2: running or closed.

enter image description here

Ubuntu – Re-run an application script when it crashes

Try this:

while true; do xterm && break; done

Applications have exit status codes so that if something exits fine it returns zero... And if something went wrong, it throws out another number. This allows people to hook in and find out the exact issue. This is what the other answer is doing.

&& just checks that the previous command was a zero-status exit and if it was, breaks the loop. If it crashes, it'll throw out something other than 0 and the && ... clause won't trigger; it'll simply loop back around and run xterm.

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Ubuntu – How to run commands from a bash file the way they run from terminal

Ubuntu – Re-run an application script when it crashes

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