Running multiple command-line apps from a Qt GUI app in Ubuntu and getting the console output

Question

I am developing a robotics application on Ubuntu 12.04 (Precise) and ROS fuerte. I have about 10 different nodes (processes) that need to be run and to switch between the different operation modes of the robot, I would also have to kill and spawn these nodes dynamically. The usual way is, of course, launching them from terminal, however I want to provide an easy-to-use GUI interface.

Is there any way I can start terminal applications from C++ code in Ubuntu while getting all their output? I want to collect all output from all the running apps and display it in a single view. It should also be possible to spawn and kill these apps on the go.

Or perhaps there's an ROS-way of doing this that I am not aware of?

Thanks!

Answer 1

The QProcess class is what you're looking for.