TUI programs with a fallback shell

avidseeker · 2026-01-08 11:48:58

Running a terminal emulator session (e.g: `lxterminal -e tui_prog`) where tui_prog accepts ctrl-z signal, pressing ctrl-z causes the terminal to hang since there is no shell to fall back to.

There are two possible solutions I see for this:

1. Run lxterminal with a shell fallback: lxterminal -e sh -c 'lf; exec sh'

2. Run shell interactively first, then execute the program on top of it.

Here I'm using `lf` file manager as the reference tui_prog mentioned.

For some reason method 1. doesn't seem to work with lxterminal and lf. Process keeps hanging.

Method two seems to hold two contradicting flags: sh -i -c '...' where -i is interactive and -c is non-interactive

What's the solution to this?

Avid

5hridhyan · 2026-01-08 12:12:37

"-i -c" is not contradictory here. An interactive shell with job control enabled must exist before lf starts, otherwise the shell cannot reclaim the TTY when lf stops.
try with

lxterminal -e sh -ic lf

or

lxterminal -e sh -ic 'set -m; lf'

Last edited by 5hridhyan (2026-01-08 13:28:19)

avidseeker · 2026-01-08 14:24:02

Hmm, both commands don't work on my end. Can you replicate?

seth · 2026-01-08 14:31:02

Tail your shell rc (eg .zshrc or .bashrc) with

[ -n "$SH_AUTOSTART" ] && env -u SH_AUTOSTART $SH_AUTOSTART; unset SH_AUTOSTART

and run

env SH_AUTOSTART=fi lxterminal

5hridhyan · 2026-01-08 14:32:45

Hmm, both commands don't work on my end. Can you replicate?

my bad, Run a real interactive session first....

Last edited by 5hridhyan (2026-01-08 15:05:08)

Arch Linux

#1 2026-01-08 11:48:58

TUI programs with a fallback shell

#2 2026-01-08 12:12:37

Re: TUI programs with a fallback shell

#3 2026-01-08 14:24:02

Re: TUI programs with a fallback shell

#4 2026-01-08 14:31:02

Re: TUI programs with a fallback shell

#5 2026-01-08 14:32:45

Re: TUI programs with a fallback shell

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