shell(1F)         MISC. REFERENCE MANUAL PAGES          shell(1F)



NAME
     shell - run a command using shell

SYNOPSIS
     shell command [command] ...

DESCRIPTION
     The shell function concatentates its  arguments,  separating
     each  by  a space, and passes this string to the UNIX system
     shell ($SHELL if set, otherwise /usr/bin/sh).

EXAMPLES
     Since the Form and Menu Language does not  directly  support
     background  processing,  the  shell  function  can  be  used
     instead.

          `shell "build prog > /dev/null &"`

     If you want the user to continue to be able to interact with
     the  application  while  the  background job is running, the
     output of an executable run by shell in the background  must
     be  redirected: to a file if you want to save the output, or
     to /dev/null if you don't want to save it (or if there is no
     output),  otherwise  your  application may appear to be hung
     until the background job finishes processing.

     shell can also be used to execute a  command  that  has  the
     same name as an FMLI built-in function.

NOTES
     The arguments to shell will be  concatenated  using  spaces,
     which may or may not do what is expected.  The variables set
     in local environments will not  be  expanded  by  the  shell
     because "local" means "local to the current process."

SEE ALSO
     sh(1).


















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