Running multiple programs in parallel from a bash script

• 1 min read

This comes in handy when I want to, for example:

  • run an MySql proxy to Cloudql or similar, then
  • run a project server (fastapi, django etc) that depends on the database connection

From this answer:

set -m  # enable job control

prog1 & prog2 && fg

This will:

  • Start prog1.
  • Send it to background, but keep printing its output.
  • Start prog2, and keep it in foreground, so you can close it with ctrl-c.
  • When you close prog2, you'll return to prog1's foreground, so you can also close it with ctrl-c.
🏷  reference , bash