TIMEOUT(1)							   User Commands							TIMEOUT(1)

NAME

       timeout - run a command with a time limit

SYNOPSIS

       timeout [OPTION] NUMBER[SUFFIX] COMMAND [ARG]...
       timeout [OPTION]

DESCRIPTION

       Start  COMMAND,	and  kill it if still running after NUMBER seconds.  SUFFIX may be `s' for seconds (the default), `m' for minutes, `h' for
       hours or `d' for days.

       Mandatory arguments to long options are mandatory for short options too.

       -s, --signal=SIGNAL

	      specify the signal to be sent on timeout.  SIGNAL may be a name like `HUP' or a number.  See `kill -l` for a list of signals

       --help
	      display this help and exit

       --version
	      output version information and exit

       If the command times out, then we exit with status 124, otherwise the normal exit status of the command is returned.  If no signal is spec-
       ified,  the  TERM signal is sent. The TERM signal will kill processes which do not catch this signal. For other processes, it may be neces-
       sary to use the KILL (9) signal, since this signal cannot be caught.

AUTHOR

       Written by Padraig Brady.

REPORTING BUGS

       Report timeout bugs to bug-coreutils@gnu.org
       GNU coreutils home page: <http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/>
       General help using GNU software: <http://www.gnu.org/gethelp/>

COPYRIGHT

       Copyright (C) 2009 Free Software Foundation, Inc.  License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.
       This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.  There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.

SEE ALSO

       kill(1)

       The full documentation for timeout is maintained as a Texinfo manual.  If the info and timeout programs	are  properly  installed  at  your
       site, the command

	      info coreutils 'timeout invocation'

       should give you access to the complete manual.

GNU coreutils 7.1						     July 2010								TIMEOUT(1)