sh script difficulties (running parallel functions)

[David Naylor]

Hi,

I am having a hard time getting (very complex script for me) to work.  The
basic idea is that this script runs a bunch of tarkets, many of which are
time consuming but low on resources (such as downloading files).  Now if I
run the tarkets all at once (given some dependancy issues) it greatly speeds
up the process (about 5 time speed increase).  However I do not know how to
do this using sh...

Example

#!/bin/sh

worker1() {
  # Copy some files
}

worker2() {
  # Download some files
}

worker3() {
  # Do something else
}

..... # and so on

run_jobs() {
  worker1 &
  worker2 &
  worker3 &
  # !!! Somehow wait for over workers to finish before continuing !!!
}

#Finished

Furthermore, how can signals be handled such that the signals get
accumulated and once all the other workers have finished the signals get
passed on (appropriately)

Thank you.

David