How to bring disowned command back into current terminal (stdout)

Question

I executed a command which I then disowned so that it can continue to run in the background, even if I closed the terminal.

The command is:

badblocks -v -s -w /dev/sdb > badblocks_result.txt 2>&1 & disown

The command is running with a PID of 1146.

How do I bring that back into the current terminal that I am using if I would like to CTRL-C the command and not kill it using the PID?

"if i would like to CTRL-C the command and not kill it using the PID" – What is the point? Upon Ctrl+c badblocks would get SIGINT just like from kill -s INT 1146, it couldn't tell the difference. In general Ctrl+c sends SIGINT to a process group, so if you target just one process with kill -s INT, something may misbehave (example); but here there should be no issues, badblocks is most likely the only process in its process group. Why do you want Ctrl+c and not kill? If you really want: reptyr. — Kamil Maciorowski, Mar 04 '24 at 20:13
As @KamilMaciorowski says there's no difference between using kill and ctrl+c. To be able to detach programs and re-attach them later look at screen or tmux. — Henrik supports the community, Mar 04 '24 at 21:15
Does this answer your question? Is it possible to add a process to the job list in bash (e.g. to reverse "disown")? — duthils, Mar 04 '24 at 21:46
@KamilMaciorowski Interestingly, i thought that it would actually know the difference. I don't actually want to kill it but if i need to i have the solution thanks to you. As badblocks usually states where and at what block it got stopped at. Which would hen output to the text file. The solution would be to use the reptyr — LogicalDeveloper, Mar 04 '24 at 23:36
Not answering the question directly, but for next time. The correct tool for this would be screen or tmux — Chris Davies, Mar 05 '24 at 15:21
Does this answer your question? How do I attach a terminal to a detached process? — Stephen Kitt, Mar 05 '24 at 17:23

score 0 · Accepted Answer · edited Mar 05 '24 at 11:11

My solution would be to use the following answer https://superuser.com/a/1231033/432690

The answer was supplied by @Kamil Maciorowski comment.

"If I would like to CTRL-C the command and not kill it using the PID" – What is the point?

Upon Ctrl+c badblocks would get SIGINT just like from kill -s INT 1146, it couldn't tell the difference. In general Ctrl+c sends SIGINT to a process group, so if you target just one process with kill -s INT, something may misbehave (example); but here there should be no issues, badblocks is most likely the only process in its process group.

Why do you want Ctrl+c and not kill? If you really want: reptyr.

How to bring disowned command back into current terminal (stdout)

1 Answers1