Run in the background even after logging off
 

If I execute this command
gzip -f -r * &

would it continue to gzip the files after I disconnect from the vnc linux session?

yes, it will run in background until it finishes its complete execution.

Why do you use vnc?
Use a X server instead, it is better on all grounds (perf, multiuser collision, CPU usage, memory usage, bandwidth, scalability, monitoring etc...)

Anyway,
if you let the terminal open, the gzip will continue even after you close the vnc session, because there is no link between the vnc session and the gzip command. However, if you close the terminal, which is the parent process, the gzip will terminate.
Use nohup if you want it to continue after the parent terminates.

That's good to know!
Can you bring it back to the foreground after logging in again at a later time?

There is no such thing as foreground and background.
If you want the output of gzip after you close the terminal, you can't because the standard output of gzip is the terminal. What you can do is redirect the output to somewhere else and check that where you redirected it.
gzip -f -r * 2>&1 >somewhere &

Yes, you can bring the jobs running in the background to foreground by using this command
for example
See, how shutdown command comes back to the foreground again.

thanks manishsingh4u for the fg command that I didn't know.
apologies to geeman2.0 for telling you couldn't bring a command to the foreground.

You can also use the nohup command.

When you log back on, a new shell is created which only knows about the child (job) processes that it has created. You can't re-connect to a child that was launched by another shell, even if that child is still running.

If you want to capture and peruse its output, use the '>', '2>' directives to pipe the stdout/stderr output to a permanent disk file.

It's your kindness. If you remember, u have helped me many times here.

I use screen for this. Before running the program in the console, type 'screen' which puts the output to a virtual terminal. To detach the screen and get back to regular console, type 'ctrl+a + ctrl+d'. If you want to reattach the screen to view the output; 'screen -r'. I run a bittorrent client on the console and use this to check the status of it remotely w/ ssh.

regards,
...drkstr

Heh, beat me to the punch. GNU screen is dead sexy, nothing more to be said. If only it'd clean my house....

yours doesn't? You must not have the latest version then. ;)

...drkstr

That's nice. Thanks for the info.

meh, cheers mate,

Wanted something like this for the exact same purpose a little while ago.