How to Force Quit a not responding application? [duplicate]

Question

VLC doesnt quit. How do I force quit the application?

I tried using vlc's PID with the killall commmand but it returned as process not found — Joydeb Roy, Commented Apr 5, 2016 at 10:07
open a terminal, type xkill + Return. Then click on the application's window. Must be a dupe of something. — Jacob Vlijm, Commented Apr 5, 2016 at 10:08
I tried sudo kill -9 PID right now and it worked for me. — Joydeb Roy, Commented Apr 5, 2016 at 10:14
Mored possible dupes: askubuntu.com/questions/13441/how-to-kill-applications askubuntu.com/questions/194471/… askubuntu.com/questions/4408/… — Takkat, Commented Apr 5, 2016 at 10:27

terdon · Accepted Answer · 2016-04-05 10:27:02Z

35

You can use based on name pkill

pkill vlc

If that doesn't work, try:

pkill -9 vlc

terdon

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answered Apr 5, 2016 at 10:21

EdiD

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I removed the sudo because i) you should never run sudo unless necessary and ii) in this case, that would have killed all cases of vlc running on the system. Not only those belonging to the OP. I also removed the -9 because that is very aggressive and is not necessary here.
– terdon
Commented Apr 5, 2016 at 10:28
2

I used -9 because OP want "force"
– EdiD
Commented Apr 5, 2016 at 10:31
Yes, I realized which is why I added it back. Still, it should be used as a last resort, not on the first try and not with sudo unless you know what you're doing. Don't get me wrong, this is a good answer, that's my upvote there :)
– terdon
Commented Apr 5, 2016 at 10:41
I guess :) and for those who have more than just one e.g. vlc instance launched using xkill is a good way to resolve the problem
– EdiD
Commented Apr 5, 2016 at 10:47
Thanks, this saves me plenty reboots
– Dieter Gribnitz
Commented Feb 16, 2021 at 6:22

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bhordupur · Accepted Answer · 2021-12-08 10:11:03Z

27

Run this command to find out the PID it is using

ps aux | grep vlc

then run

sudo kill -9 <PID NUMBER>

answered Apr 5, 2016 at 10:08

bhordupur

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I would rather be interesting finding the cause for this. And get it fixed by raising bug.
– Pushpendra
Commented Dec 21, 2019 at 18:02
1

I believe this answer is ambiguous. It possibly works if you know that PID is meant to be a number? to type the second command in literally I think might fail better to wrap the PID in <> e.g. sudo kill -9 <PID NUMBER>
– TheArchitecta
Commented Nov 25, 2021 at 21:31
That's pretty basic. PID is always a number.
– bhordupur
Commented Nov 25, 2021 at 22:37
1

@NZDev updated the answer.
– bhordupur
Commented Dec 8, 2021 at 10:11

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