How can I run and monitor multiple commands, preferably with gnome-terminal?

Question

I have tried the following:

[matt@arch-desktop ~]$ gnome-terminal --window -e 'echo foo' --tab -e 'echo bar'
# Option “-e” is deprecated and might be removed in a later version of gnome-terminal.
# Use “-- ” to terminate the options and put the command line to execute after it.
# Option “-e” is deprecated and might be removed in a later version of gnome-terminal.
# Use “-- ” to terminate the options and put the command line to execute after it.

but it appears the option no longer exists. This works on my Debian 9 system, but my Arch install is newer.

[matt@arch-desktop ~]$ gnome-terminal --version
# GNOME Terminal 3.36.2 using VTE 0.60.2 +BIDI +GNUTLS +ICU +SYSTEMD

So my question is this: is there no longer a way to execute a terminal with multiple tabs, with each tab running a predefined command? I have some background processes to run and I would like to monitor the status of each by switching tabs. How do I achieve this? It does not necessarily have to be in gnome-terminal; screen may be a viable option as well.

I ultimately want to create a script that will run these commands for me. There are about 10 processes I want to run, so I don't want to type in the commands for each of them every time.

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

The command you provided should still work in 3.36 despite the deprecation message and there are currently no plans to remove the option: https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gnome-terminal/-/issues/58#note_372375. I've also verified that it works on Fedora 32 with gnome-terminal 3.36.

One reason why it could appear to not work is that by default gnome-terminal closes the tab/window once the command has finished. Usually that command is a shell which does not quit until manually terminated/exited. But echo will exit immediately after printing the text. This can be changed in the profile settings.