Nohup Command in Linux

When exiting the shell of a Linux System, all running processes are usually terminated or hang up. So what do you do If you still want to keep the processes running even exiting the shell/terminal? This is where the nohup command comes in.

Nohup Command

Nohup, short for no hang up is a command in Linux systems that keep processes running even after exiting the shell or terminal.

Nohup prevents the processes or jobs from receiving the SIGHUP (Signal Hang UP) signal. This is a signal that is sent to a process upon closing or exiting the terminal. In this guide, we take a look at the nohup command and demonstrate how it can be used.

Nohup Command Syntax

Nohup command syntax is as follows;

Copy
nohup command arguments

OR

Copy
nohup options

Let’s see how the command comes into play

Checking the version of Nohup

You can begin by checking the version of Nohup using the syntax below

Copy
nohup --version

Output

Starting a process using Nohup

If you want to keep your processes/jobs running, precede the command with nohup as shown below. The jobs will still continue running in the shell and will not get killed upon exiting the shell or terminal.

Copy
nohup ./hello.sh 

Output

From the output above, the output of the command has been saved to nohup.out to verify this run,

Copy
cat nohup.out

Output

Additionally, you can opt to redirect the output to a different file as shown

Copy
nohup ./hello.sh > output.txt

Once again, to view the file run

Copy
cat output.txt

Output

To redirect to a file and to standard error and output use the > filename 2>&1 attribute as shown

Copy
nohup ./hello.sh > myoutput.txt >2&1 

Output

Starting a process in the background using Nohup

To start a process in the background use the & symbol at the end of the command. In this example, we are pinging google.com and sending it to the background.

Copy
nohup ping google.com &

Output

To check the process when resuming the shell use the pgrep command as shown

Copy
pgrep -a ping

Output

If you want to stop or kill the running process, use the killcommand followed by the process ID as shown

Copy
kill 2565

Output

Summary

1. All processes that are run using the nohup command will ignore the SIGHUP signal even upon exiting the shell.
2. Once a job is started or executed using the nohup command, stdin will not be available to the user.
3. By default, the nohup.out is used as the default file for stdout and stderr.

About Pankaj

I love Open Source technologies and writing about my experience about them is my passion. You can connect with me directly on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube.