WAITPID(1)

✨ WAITPID(1) ✨

okay so bestie, we're in the User Commands corner of the waitpid manual page and honestly? it's giving "small utility, big main character energy" 💅

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🌸 NAME 🌸

waitpid — the lil utility that just... waits for arbitrary processes. that's it. that's the whole job. she waits. 🫶

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🦋 SYNOPSIS 🦋

waitpid [-v] [--timeout|-t seconds] PID[:inode]...

like literally just hand her some PIDs and she'll stand there politely until they're gone ✨

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💖 DESCRIPTION 💖

waitpid is a simple command that waits for arbitrary non-child processes. not her kids, not her problem, but she'll wait anyway because she's a queen 👑

She exits once all the processes whose PIDs you passed as arguments have exited. every single one. she does not leave early. she is committed. 💀

Optionally, you can address a process with the format PID:inode. The inode identifies the unique process's file descriptor — it's like a process's little fingerprint so you know you're waiting on the right one and not some impostor 🕵️‍♀️

To retrieve a process's inode number you can use the getino(1) utility. go get that number, bring it back, and drop it in with a colon. iykyk 🌈

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🎀 OPTIONS 🎀

• -v, --verbose — be more verbose. she'll tell you more about what's happening instead of just silently standing there 💬
• -t, --timeout seconds — maximum wait time. she'll only wait this long, then she's out ✋
• -e, --exited — don't error on already exited PIDs. like if they already left the party before you got there, no big deal, she's not gonna be dramatic about it 🙈
• -c, --count count — number of process exits to wait for. you pick the number, she counts them down 🔢
• -h, --help — display help text and exit. the classic "explain yourself" move 💅
• -V, --version — display version and exit. she'll tell you who she is ⭐

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👑 EXIT STATUS 👑

waitpid has the following exit status values, and bestie, you need to know these:

• 0 — success 🎉 she waited, everything worked, slay
• 1 — unspecified failure 😭 something went wrong, nobody's saying what
• 2 — system does not provide necessary functionality 🚫 your system simply cannot, it's not giving what needs to be given
• 3 — timeout expired ⏰ the clock ran out, she's done waiting, periodt

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💜 AUTHORS 💜

Thomas Weißschuh <thomas@t-8ch.de> — the icon who made this happen 🫶

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🌟 SEE ALSO 🌟

waitpid(2) wait(1P) getino(1)

go read those too, they're all part of the same little universe 🌈

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🐛 REPORTING BUGS 🐛

Found a bug? bestie, tell someone! For bug reports, use the issue tracker:

<https://github.com/util-linux/util-linux/issues>

she wants to be better and she needs your help to do it 🥺

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🧚 AVAILABILITY 🧚

The waitpid command is part of the util-linux package, which can be downloaded from the Linux Kernel Archive:

<https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/>

go get it, it's free, it's iconic ✨

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and that's the whole page bestie 💖 this was util-linux 2.42.4 vibes from 2026-09-21 — no cap, she waits, she slays, she exits cleanly 🎀💅✨