how to execute command after current running command in bash?

Question

I'm downloading file with wget, and I want to turn off my computer after downloading will be finished, but I need to go somewhere now :) Is it possible to execute command in bash exacly when process will be finished?

I know that this works:

wget http://example.com/file.rar; shutdown now

But what if I type only:

wget http://example.com/file.rar

Answer 1

You can do something like this:

1. stop execution of wget with ctrl-z (it's not stopped, it's suspended)
2. put it into background (bg)
3. run: wait; shutdown -h now

wait will wait for all programs ran in background from current shell - i.e. this wget.

After wait will finish - shutdown will go on.

Answer 2

In another shell, use

ps -u <your username> | grep wget

to find the PID of the command you want to wait on, then

wait <PID>; shutdown -h now

so that shutdown will not run until process has terminated. See also depesz's answer.

Answer 3

Yes, just type out your second command and press enter. If your current program is scrolling text you can't see what you're typing correctly so watch your keys so you do it right.

A smarter way is to switch to another TTY (CTRL+ALT+F1 through F6) and run the command simultaneously, or if you're using a command-line program like screen you could create a new window in it.

Answer 4

My solutions is this: suspend your long-running task with Control+Z, then type something like:

fg; echo "Done!"

If you want to run react differently based on the success or failure of your command, use && and || as short-circuit operators.

fg && echo "Success!" || echo "Failure!"

EDIT: This won't work with sudo, because it will ask for your password. I have, accordingly, removed the examples using sudo. If you need sudo for the second task, use another of the methods posted here.

On the other hand, I believe that both GNOME and KDE offer ways to trigger a shutdown/reboot without using sudo, by sending an appropriate D-Bus signal or something.

Answer 5

If you want to get fancy, check the return status of the wget and only shutdown if it was successful.

% wget http://example.com/file.rar
% if [ $? -eq 0 ]
> then
> shutdown now
> fi