Execute a shell function with timeout

Question

Why would this work

timeout 10s echo \"foo bar\" # foo bar

but this wouldn\'t

function echoFooBar {
  echo \"foo bar\"
}

e         


        

Answer 1

You can create a function which would allow you to do the same as timeout but also for other functions:

function run_cmd { 
    cmd="$1"; timeout="$2";
    grep -qP '^\d+$' <<< $timeout || timeout=10

    ( 
        eval "$cmd" &
        child=$!
        trap -- "" SIGTERM 
        (       
                sleep $timeout
                kill $child 2> /dev/null 
        ) &     
        wait $child
    )
}

And could run as below:

run_cmd "echoFooBar" 10

Note: The solution came from one of my questions: Elegant solution to implement timeout for bash commands and functions