Check if a process is running using Bash

Question

I am trying to check if a process is running with the code below:

SERVICE=\"./yowsup/yowsup-cli\"
RESULT=`ps aux | grep $SERVICE`

if [ \"${RESULT:-null}\" =         


        

Answer 1

## bash

## function to check if a process is alive and running:

_isRunning() {
    ps -o comm= -C "$1" 2>/dev/null | grep -x "$1" >/dev/null 2>&1
}

## example 1: checking if "gedit" is running

if _isRunning gedit; then
    echo "gedit is running"
else
    echo "gedit is not running"
fi

## example 2: start lxpanel if it is not there

if ! _isRunning lxpanel; then
    lxpanel &
fi

## or

_isRunning lxpanel || (lxpanel &)

---

Note: pgrep -x lxpanel or pidof lxpanel still reports that lxpanel is running even when it is defunct (zombie); so to get alive-and-running process, we need to use ps and grep