I have two bash scripts:
a.sh:
echo "running"
doit=true
if [ $doit = true ];then
./b.sh &
fi
some-long-operation-binary
echo "done"
b.sh:
for i in {0..50}; do
echo "counting";
sleep 1;
done
I get this output:
> ./a.sh
running
counting
Why do I only see the first "counting" from b.sh and then nothing anymore? (Currently some-long-operation-binary just sleep 5 for this example). I first thought that due to setting b.sh in the background, its STDOUT is lost, but why do I see the first output? More importantly: is b.sh still running and doing its thing (its iteration)?
For context:
b.sh is going to poll a service provided by some-long-operation-binary, which is only available after some time the latter has run, and when ready, would write its content to a file.
Apologies if this is just rubbish, it's a bit late...
You should add #!/bin/bash or the like to b.sh that uses a Bash-like expansion, to make sure Bash is actually running the script. Otherwise there may be (indeed) only one loop iteration happening.
When you start a background process, it is usually a good practice to kill it and wait for it, no matter which way the script exits.
#!/bin/bash
set -e -o pipefail
declare -i show_counter=1
counter() {
local -i i
for ((i = 0;; ++i)); do
echo "counting $((i))"
sleep 1
done
}
echo starting
if ((show_counter)); then
counter &
declare -i counter_pid="${!}"
trap 'kill "${counter_pid}"
wait -n "${counter_pid}" || :
echo terminating' EXIT
fi
sleep 10 # long-running process
I am trying to create one script which check for a running process and start it if it is not running.
Here is test.sh
#!/bin/bash
if pgrep infiloop > /dev/null ;
then
echo "Process is running."
else
exec /u/team/infiloop.sh > /u/team/infiloopOutput.txt
echo "Process was not running."
fi
And infiloop.sh
#!/bin/sh
while true
do
echo "helllo"
sleep 2
done
Now when i run the 1st script , it starts the script but after it start it doesn't allow me to run another command.
Output:
[user#host ~]$ ./checkforRunningJob.sh
^C
I have to press Ctrl+C, Ctrl+Z, and once i do that my infinite script also stop.
Could you please check.
Thanks.
You can put the process in the background with &:
#!/bin/bash
if pgrep infiloop > /dev/null ;
then
echo "Process is running."
else
exec /u/team/infiloop.sh > /u/team/infiloopOutput.txt &
echo "Process was not running, started process $!"
fi
I am writing a script which will run an external program (arecord) and do some cleanup if it's interrupted by either a POSIX signal or input on a named pipe. Here's the draft in full
#!/bin/bash
X=`date '+%Y-%m-%d_%H.%M.%S'`
F=/tmp/$X.wav
P=/tmp/$X.$$.fifo
mkfifo $P
trap "echo interrupted && (rm $P || echo 'couldnt delete $P') && echo 'removed fifo' && exit" INT
# this forked process will wait for input on the fifo
(echo 'waiting for fifo' && cat $P >/dev/null && echo 'fifo hit' && kill -s SIGINT $$)&
while true
do
echo waiting...
sleep 1
done
#arecord $F
This works perfectly as it is: the script ends when a signal arrives and a signal is generated if the fifo is written-to.
But instead of the while true loop I want the now-commented-out arecord command, but if I run that program instead of the loop the SIGINT doesn't get caught in the trap and arecord keeps running.
What should I do?
It sounds like you really need this to work more like an init script. So, start arecord in the background and put the pid in a file. Then use the trap to kill the arecord process based on the pidfile.
#!/bin/bash
PIDFILE=/var/run/arecord-runner.pid #Just somewhere to store the pid
LOGFILE=/var/log/arecord-runner.log
#Just one option for how to format your trap call
#Note that this does not use &&, so one failed function will not
# prevent other items in the trap from running
trapFunc() {
echo interrupted
(rm $P || echo 'couldnt delete $P')
echo 'removed fifo'
kill $(cat $PIDFILE)
exit 0
}
X=`date '+%Y-%m-%d_%H.%M.%S'`
F=/tmp/$X.wav
P=/tmp/$X.$$.fifo
mkfifo $P
trap "trapFunc" INT
# this forked process will wait for input on the fifo
(echo 'waiting for fifo' && cat $P >/dev/null && echo 'fifo hit' && kill -s SIGINT $$)&
arecord $F 1>$LOGFILE 2>&1 & #Run in the background, sending logs to file
echo $! > $PIDFILE #Save pid of the last background process to file
while true
do
echo waiting...
sleep 1
done
Also... you may have your trap written with '&&' clauses for a reason, but as an alternative, you can give a function name as I did above, or a sort of anonymous function like this:
trap "{ command1; command2 args; command3; exit 0; }"
Just make sure that each command is followed by a semicolon and there are spaces between the braces and the commands. The risk of using && in the trap is that your script will continue to run past the interrupt if one of the commands before the exit fails to execute (but maybe you want that?).
In my bash script, I'm running an external command that's stored in $cmd variable. (It could be anything, even some simple bash oneliner.)
If ctrl+C is pressed while running the script, I want it to kill the currently running $cmd but it should still continue running the main script. However, I would like to preserve the option to kill the main script with ctrl+C when the main script is running.
#!/bin/bash
cmd='read -p "Ooook?" something; echo $something; sleep 4 '
while true; do
echo "running cmd.."
eval "$cmd" # ctrl-C now should terminate the eval and print "done cmd"
echo "done cmd"
sleep 5 # ctrl-C now should terminate the main script
done
Any idea how to do it some nice bash way?
Changes applied based on answers:
#! /bin/bash
cmd='read -p "Ooook1?" something; read -p "Oook2?" ; echo $something; sleep 4 '
while true; do
echo "running cmd.."
trap "echo Interrupted" INT
eval "($cmd)" # ctrl-C now should terminate the eval and print "done cmd"
trap - INT
echo "done cmd"
sleep 5 # ctrl-C now should terminate the main script
done
Now, pressing ctrl+C while "Ooook1?" read will break the eval only after that read is done. (it will interrupt just before "Oook2") However it will interrupt "sleep 4" instantly.
In both cases it will do the right thing - it will just interrupt the eval subshell, so we're almost there - just that weird read behaviour..
If you can afford having the eval part run in a subshell, "all" you need to do is trap SIGINT.
#! /bin/bash
cmd='read -p "Ooook1?" something; read -p "Oook2?" ; echo $something; sleep 4 '
while true; do
echo "running cmd.."
trap "echo Interrupted" INT
eval "($cmd)" # ctrl-C now should terminate the eval and print "done cmd"
trap - INT
echo "done cmd"
sleep 5 # ctrl-C now should terminate the main script
done
Don't know if that will fit your specific need though.
$ ./t.sh
running cmd..
Ooook1?^CInterrupted
done cmd
^C
$ ./t.sh
running cmd..
Ooook1?qsdqs^CInterrupted
done cmd
^C
$ ./t.sh
running cmd..
Ooook1?qsd
Oook2?^CInterrupted
done cmd
^C
$
GNU bash, version 4.1.9(2)-release (x86_64-pc-linux-gnu)
You can determine whether the sleep command exited abnormally by examining the last exit status echo $?. A non-zero status probably indicates Ctrl-C.
No, read is not an external command, it is internal builtin bash command being executed in the same process as the other instructions. So at Ctrl-C all the process will be killed.
P.S.
Yes. you can execute command in subshell. Something like this
#!/bin/bash
cmd='trap - INT; echo $$; read -p "Ooook?" something; echo $something; sleep 4 '
echo $$
while true; do
echo "$cmd" > tmpfile
echo "running cmd.."
trap "" INT
bash tmpfile
rm tmpfile
trap - INT
echo "done cmd"
sleep 5 # ctrl-C now should terminate the main script
done
I'm wondering if there is a better way to make a daemon that waits for something using only sh than:
#! /bin/sh
trap processUserSig SIGUSR1
processUserSig() {
echo "doing stuff"
}
while true; do
sleep 1000
done
In particular, I'm wondering if there's any way to get rid of the loop and still have the thing listen for the signals.
Just backgrounding your script (./myscript &) will not daemonize it. See http://www.faqs.org/faqs/unix-faq/programmer/faq/, section 1.7, which describes what's necessary to become a daemon. You must disconnect it from the terminal so that SIGHUP does not kill it. You can take a shortcut to make a script appear to act like a daemon;
nohup ./myscript 0<&- &>/dev/null &
will do the job. Or, to capture both stderr and stdout to a file:
nohup ./myscript 0<&- &> my.admin.log.file &
Redirection explained (see bash redirection)
0<&- closes stdin
&> file sends stdout and stderr to a file
However, there may be further important aspects that you need to consider. For example:
You will still have a file descriptor open to the script, which means that the directory it's mounted in would be unmountable. To be a true daemon you should chdir("/") (or cd / inside your script), and fork so that the parent exits, and thus the original descriptor is closed.
Perhaps run umask 0. You may not want to depend on the umask of the caller of the daemon.
For an example of a script that takes all of these aspects into account, see Mike S' answer.
Some of the top-upvoted answers here are missing some important parts of what makes a daemon a daemon, as opposed to just a background process, or a background process detached from a shell.
This http://www.faqs.org/faqs/unix-faq/programmer/faq/ describes what is necessary to be a daemon. And this Run bash script as daemon implements the setsid, though it misses the chdir to root.
The original poster's question was actually more specific than "How do I create a daemon process using bash?", but since the subject and answers discuss daemonizing shell scripts generally, I think it's important to point it out (for interlopers like me looking into the fine details of creating a daemon).
Here's my rendition of a shell script that would behave according to the FAQ. Set DEBUG to true to see pretty output (but it also exits immediately rather than looping endlessly):
#!/bin/bash
DEBUG=false
# This part is for fun, if you consider shell scripts fun- and I do.
trap process_USR1 SIGUSR1
process_USR1() {
echo 'Got signal USR1'
echo 'Did you notice that the signal was acted upon only after the sleep was done'
echo 'in the while loop? Interesting, yes? Yes.'
exit 0
}
# End of fun. Now on to the business end of things.
print_debug() {
whatiam="$1"; tty="$2"
[[ "$tty" != "not a tty" ]] && {
echo "" >$tty
echo "$whatiam, PID $$" >$tty
ps -o pid,sess,pgid -p $$ >$tty
tty >$tty
}
}
me_DIR="$( cd "$( dirname "${BASH_SOURCE[0]}" )" && pwd )"
me_FILE=$(basename $0)
cd /
#### CHILD HERE --------------------------------------------------------------------->
if [ "$1" = "child" ] ; then # 2. We are the child. We need to fork again.
shift; tty="$1"; shift
$DEBUG && print_debug "*** CHILD, NEW SESSION, NEW PGID" "$tty"
umask 0
$me_DIR/$me_FILE XXrefork_daemonXX "$tty" "$#" </dev/null >/dev/null 2>/dev/null &
$DEBUG && [[ "$tty" != "not a tty" ]] && echo "CHILD OUT" >$tty
exit 0
fi
##### ENTRY POINT HERE -------------------------------------------------------------->
if [ "$1" != "XXrefork_daemonXX" ] ; then # 1. This is where the original call starts.
tty=$(tty)
$DEBUG && print_debug "*** PARENT" "$tty"
setsid $me_DIR/$me_FILE child "$tty" "$#" &
$DEBUG && [[ "$tty" != "not a tty" ]] && echo "PARENT OUT" >$tty
exit 0
fi
##### RUNS AFTER CHILD FORKS (actually, on Linux, clone()s. See strace -------------->
# 3. We have been reforked. Go to work.
exec >/tmp/outfile
exec 2>/tmp/errfile
exec 0</dev/null
shift; tty="$1"; shift
$DEBUG && print_debug "*** DAEMON" "$tty"
# The real stuff goes here. To exit, see fun (above)
$DEBUG && [[ "$tty" != "not a tty" ]] && echo NOT A REAL DAEMON. NOT RUNNING WHILE LOOP. >$tty
$DEBUG || {
while true; do
echo "Change this loop, so this silly no-op goes away." >/dev/null
echo "Do something useful with your life, young padawan." >/dev/null
sleep 10
done
}
$DEBUG && [[ "$tty" != "not a tty" ]] && sleep 3 && echo "DAEMON OUT" >$tty
exit # This may never run. Why is it here then? It's pretty.
# Kind of like, "The End" at the end of a movie that you
# already know is over. It's always nice.
Output looks like this when DEBUG is set to true. Notice how the session and process group ID (SESS, PGID) numbers change:
<shell_prompt>$ bash blahd
*** PARENT, PID 5180
PID SESS PGID
5180 1708 5180
/dev/pts/6
PARENT OUT
<shell_prompt>$
*** CHILD, NEW SESSION, NEW PGID, PID 5188
PID SESS PGID
5188 5188 5188
not a tty
CHILD OUT
*** DAEMON, PID 5198
PID SESS PGID
5198 5188 5188
not a tty
NOT A REAL DAEMON. NOT RUNNING WHILE LOOP.
DAEMON OUT
# double background your script to have it detach from the tty
# cf. http://www.linux-mag.com/id/5981
(./program.sh &) &
Use your system's daemon facility, such as start-stop-daemon.
Otherwise, yes, there has to be a loop somewhere.
$ ( cd /; umask 0; setsid your_script.sh </dev/null &>/dev/null & ) &
It really depends on what is the binary itself going to do.
For example I want to create some listener.
The starting Daemon is simple task :
lis_deamon :
#!/bin/bash
# We will start the listener as Deamon process
#
LISTENER_BIN=/tmp/deamon_test/listener
test -x $LISTENER_BIN || exit 5
PIDFILE=/tmp/deamon_test/listener.pid
case "$1" in
start)
echo -n "Starting Listener Deamon .... "
startproc -f -p $PIDFILE $LISTENER_BIN
echo "running"
;;
*)
echo "Usage: $0 start"
exit 1
;;
esac
this is how we start the daemon (common way for all /etc/init.d/ staff)
now as for the listener it self,
It must be some kind of loop/alert or else that will trigger the script
to do what u want. For example if u want your script to sleep 10 min
and wake up and ask you how you are doing u will do this with the
while true ; do sleep 600 ; echo "How are u ? " ; done
Here is the simple listener that u can do that will listen for your
commands from remote machine and execute them on local :
listener :
#!/bin/bash
# Starting listener on some port
# we will run it as deamon and we will send commands to it.
#
IP=$(hostname --ip-address)
PORT=1024
FILE=/tmp/backpipe
count=0
while [ -a $FILE ] ; do #If file exis I assume that it used by other program
FILE=$FILE.$count
count=$(($count + 1))
done
# Now we know that such file do not exist,
# U can write down in deamon it self the remove for those files
# or in different part of program
mknod $FILE p
while true ; do
netcat -l -s $IP -p $PORT < $FILE |/bin/bash > $FILE
done
rm $FILE
So to start UP it : /tmp/deamon_test/listener start
and to send commands from shell (or wrap it to script) :
test_host#netcat 10.184.200.22 1024
uptime
20:01pm up 21 days 5:10, 44 users, load average: 0.62, 0.61, 0.60
date
Tue Jan 28 20:02:00 IST 2014
punt! (Cntrl+C)
Hope this will help.
Have a look at the daemon tool from the libslack package:
http://ingvar.blog.linpro.no/2009/05/18/todays-sysadmin-tip-using-libslack-daemon-to-daemonize-a-script/
On Mac OS X use a launchd script for shell daemon.
If I had a script.sh and i wanted to execute it from bash and leave it running even when I want to close my bash session then I would combine nohup and & at the end.
example: nohup ./script.sh < inputFile.txt > ./logFile 2>&1 &
inputFile.txt can be any file. If your file has no input then we usually use /dev/null. So the command would be:
nohup ./script.sh < /dev/null > ./logFile 2>&1 &
After that close your bash session,open another terminal and execute: ps -aux | egrep "script.sh" and you will see that your script is still running at the background. Of cource,if you want to stop it then execute the same command (ps) and kill -9 <PID-OF-YOUR-SCRIPT>
See Bash Service Manager project: https://github.com/reduardo7/bash-service-manager
Implementation example
#!/usr/bin/env bash
export PID_FILE_PATH="/tmp/my-service.pid"
export LOG_FILE_PATH="/tmp/my-service.log"
export LOG_ERROR_FILE_PATH="/tmp/my-service.error.log"
. ./services.sh
run-script() {
local action="$1" # Action
while true; do
echo "### Running action '${action}'"
echo foo
echo bar >&2
[ "$action" = "run" ] && return 0
sleep 5
[ "$action" = "debug" ] && exit 25
done
}
before-start() {
local action="$1" # Action
echo "* Starting with $action"
}
after-finish() {
local action="$1" # Action
local serviceExitCode=$2 # Service exit code
echo "* Finish with $action. Exit code: $serviceExitCode"
}
action="$1"
serviceName="Example Service"
serviceMenu "$action" "$serviceName" run-script "$workDir" before-start after-finish
Usage example
$ ./example-service
# Actions: [start|stop|restart|status|run|debug|tail(-[log|error])]
$ ./example-service start
# Starting Example Service service...
$ ./example-service status
# Serive Example Service is runnig with PID 5599
$ ./example-service stop
# Stopping Example Service...
$ ./example-service status
# Service Example Service is not running
Here is the minimal change to the original proposal to create a valid daemon in Bourne shell (or Bash):
#!/bin/sh
if [ "$1" != "__forked__" ]; then
setsid "$0" __forked__ "$#" &
exit
else
shift
fi
trap 'siguser1=true' SIGUSR1
trap 'echo "Clean up and exit"; kill $sleep_pid; exit' SIGTERM
exec > outfile
exec 2> errfile
exec 0< /dev/null
while true; do
(sleep 30000000 &>/dev/null) &
sleep_pid=$!
wait
kill $sleep_pid &>/dev/null
if [ -n "$siguser1" ]; then
siguser1=''
echo "Wait was interrupted by SIGUSR1, do things here."
fi
done
Explanation:
Line 2-7: A daemon must be forked so it doesn't have a parent. Using an artificial argument to prevent endless forking. "setsid" detaches from starting process and terminal.
Line 9: Our desired signal needs to be differentiated from other signals.
Line 10: Cleanup is required to get rid of dangling "sleep" processes.
Line 11-13: Redirect stdout, stderr and stdin of the script.
Line 16: sleep in the background
Line 18: wait waits for end of sleep, but gets interrupted by (some) signals.
Line 19: Kill sleep process, because that is still running when signal is caught.
Line 22: Do the work if SIGUSR1 has been caught.
Guess it does not get any simpler than that.
Like many answers this one is not a "real" daemonization but rather an alternative to nohup approach.
echo "script.sh" | at now
There are obviously differences from using nohup. For one there is no detaching from the parent in the first place. Also "script.sh" doesn't inherit parent's environment.
By no means this is a better alternative. It is simply a different (and somewhat lazy) way of launching processes in background.
P.S. I personally upvoted carlo's answer as it seems to be the most elegant and works both from terminal and inside scripts
try executing using &
if you save this file as program.sh
you can use
$. program.sh &