starting program in new terminal window

Question

I have a program that needs to start another program. On my mac I did this using system("open path"), but on linux that doesn't work. and using system(./path) is not what I want since than it overtakes the running program.

So is there any way to get the same behaviour as the mac 'open path' command on linux?

(linux noob btw:p)

Answer 1

If you're running the application in a GUI environment, this should be possible but the approach is different. You need to start a new terminal instance explicitly.

Determine the path to your terminal application. This depends on the linux distribution. Next, check the documentation of that particular terminal application and find out how it can be started to run an application (your application) instead of a shell. This probably involves using some application-specific command line options. Test that in a terminal window, until you have a command line that gives you the desired result. Things could get a little tricky if your application needs command line arguments as well. Use the -- option where necessary.

Then, all you need to do is run that command line from your "parent" application. I would advise however to not use system(). The exec... family functions (using fork and wait) provide better control.