Hi Everyone,

Update: here is a much better way to install iDempiere.

The purpose of this post is to offer easy instructions on how to launch iDempiere (open source ERP), disconnect from an SSH client (like Putty), and successfully keep iDempiere alive.

If you have not already launched the iDempiere server:

  1. cd to idempiere directory
  2. “nohup ./idempiere-server.sh &”
  3. “ps aux” if you want to confirm the job is running
  4. disconnect from your SSH client
  5. connect to iDempiere from another machine to confirm
  6. Learn more about nohup

If you have already launched iDempiere, use the following instructions:

  1. ctrl+z to pause iDempiere
  2. “bg” to move the process to the background
  3. “jobs” to see get the background job number [no in brackets]
  4. “disown -h %1” where 1 was the job number of iDempiere
  5. disconnect from yoru SSH client
  6. connect to iDempiere from another machine to confirm

If you want to stop the server, use the following instructions:

  1. Issue “ps aux” and write down the process id. iDempiere will be the java process using all the memory. Issue “kill -15 processid” where processid is the number/id listed in the ps aux results.
  2. If kill -15 does not work, try kill -9.


  1. Here is a lengthy discussion describing the various Linux methods to accomplish the above task.
  2. There exists a script (..idempiere-server/utils/unix/idempiere_Debian.sh) designed to run iDempiere as a service. It takes quite a bit of Linux horsepower to get this script to work as intended. The greatest advantage this script offers is its stopping power. If you wanted to create a cron job to stop and start the application server, this file is your easiest way to know how to find and stop iDempiere.
  3. If you have not already installed iDempiere, here is a tutorial describing how to install it in minutes.

I hope this helps!!!



You can contact me by phone using 512.850.6068.

My email is chuck@chuboe.com.

You can complete the form on this page.


Chuck Boecking



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