[CentOS] command to ensure other command does last longer than 5 seconds

[Peter Gross]

Jerry Geis wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I am wondering if there exists a centos command that runs another command
> and ensures the second command doesnt take more than x seconds? When x 
> is given on the command line.
> 
> If the second command is not "done" the first command will just kill it
> and both exit.
> 
> Does such a method or command exist?
> 
> I just need to ensure the second command does just continue to run and 
> run and run.

Here's my admittedly kludgey quick and dirty way of doing this .... 
write a shell script that does the following:

1. takes two arguments -- the command to run (in quotes) and then the 
drip dead time (in seconds? or minutes?)

2. start the command in the background, saving its PID in a var (say $pid).

3. create an "at" job to kill the pid at the appointed time, as in:

echo kill -TERM $pid | at now + 15 minutes

If the job has already finished, the kill -TERM will hopefully be 
harmless (i.e., the pid's haven't cycled around and there is now a new, 
but different, job with the same pid).