.TH swait "1" "Slurm Commands" "Slurm 26.05" "Slurm Commands"

.SH "NAME"
swait \- Block until a job's running steps and pending \-\-async steps complete

.SH "SYNOPSIS"
\fBswait\fR [\fIOPTIONS\fR] [\fIjobid\fR[_\fItask\fR] | \fBs\fR<\fIsluid\fR>]

.SH "DESCRIPTION"
\fBswait\fR blocks until there are no running steps and no pending
\fB\-\-async\fR steps. Use \fBswait\fR in a batch script to wait for
all \fB\-\-async\fR steps to complete.

\fBswait\fR talks directly to the stepmgr; it does not poll
\fBslurmctld\fR. The target job must have stepmgr enabled (see
\fBREQUIREMENTS\fR).

The positional argument is a numeric job ID, a single array task
(e.g. \fI1000_3\fR), or a SLUID (e.g. \fIs4SNKN57XZTE00\fR). Task ranges,
task lists, and het\-job component offsets (\fIjobid\fR+\fIoffset\fR) are
not supported. When the target is an array job with more than one task,
a specific task must be selected with \fIjobid\fR_\fItask\fR.

With no positional argument, \fBswait\fR consults \fBSLURM_JOB_SLUID\fR
first, and falls back to \fBSLURM_JOB_ID\fR. This lets \fBswait\fR run
inside a batch script or interactive allocation with no arguments and
automatically wait on the enclosing job's steps.

.SH "OPTIONS"
.TP
\fB\-h\fR, \fB\-\-help\fR
Print help information and exit.
.IP

.TP
\fB\-Q\fR, \fB\-\-quiet\fR
Suppress informational messages from appearing on stderr.
Errors will still be displayed. Mutually exclusive with
\fB\-\-verbose\fR.
.IP

.TP
\fB\-\-timeout\fR=\fISECS\fR
Wait at most \fISECS\fR seconds for the job's steps to drain, then exit
1. \fISECS\fR must be a non-negative integer. With no \fB\-\-timeout\fR,
or with \fB\-\-timeout\fR=0, \fBswait\fR blocks indefinitely until the
steps drain.
.IP

.TP
\fB\-\-usage\fR
Print a short usage line and exit.
.IP

.TP
\fB\-v\fR, \fB\-\-verbose\fR
Increase verbosity; may be specified multiple times for more detail.
Mutually exclusive with \fB\-\-quiet\fR.
.IP

.TP
\fB\-V\fR, \fB\-\-version\fR
Print version information and exit.
.IP

.SH "REQUIREMENTS"
The target job must have stepmgr enabled, either site\-wide via
\fBSlurmctldParameters=enable_stepmgr\fR in \fBslurm.conf\fR(5), or
per\-job via \fB\-\-stepmgr\fR to \fBsalloc\fR(1)/\fBsbatch\fR(1).
This can be verified with \fBscontrol show job <jobid>\fR; look for
\fBStepMgrEnabled=Yes\fR.

.SH "ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES"
.PP
Some \fBswait\fR options may be set via environment variables. These
environment variables, along with their corresponding options, are listed below.
(Note: Command line options will always override these settings.)

.TP
\fBSLURM_JOB_SLUID\fR
Used to identify the job to monitor when no positional argument is given.
Takes precedence over \fBSLURM_JOB_ID\fR.
.IP

.TP
\fBSLURM_JOB_ID\fR
Used to identify the job to monitor when no positional argument is given and
\fBSLURM_JOB_SLUID\fR is not set.
.IP

.TP
\fBSLURM_CONF\fR
Location of the Slurm configuration file.
.IP

.SH "EXIT STATUS"
.TP
\fB0\fR
.RS
There are no running steps, and no pending async steps.
.RE
.IP

.TP
\fB1\fR
.RS
\fB\-\-timeout\fR elapsed before steps completed.
.RE
.IP

.TP
\fB2\fR
.RS
\fBswait\fR encountered an error.
.RE
.IP

.SH "EXAMPLES"

Run multiple async steps from a batch script and block on them. The
\fB\-\-stepmgr\fR flag may be omitted if stepmgr is enabled site\-wide.

.nf
#!/bin/bash
#SBATCH \-n 16
#SBATCH \-\-stepmgr
srun \-\-async \-n 8 ./solve_a
srun \-\-async \-n 8 ./solve_b
swait
.fi

\fBswait\fR is only for \fB\-\-async\fR steps; if a script merely
backgrounds \fBsrun\fR commands with the shell, the shell's \fIwait\fR
builtin already covers that case and \fBswait\fR is not needed. The
exception is when a script mixes both: run \fBswait\fR followed by
\fIwait\fR so that the stepmgr's pending work and the shell's
background processes have both finished:

.nf
#!/bin/bash
#SBATCH \-n 16
#SBATCH \-\-stepmgr
srun \-n 8 ./solve_a &
srun \-\-async \-n 8 ./solve_b
swait
wait
.fi

.SH "COPYING"
Copyright (c) 2026 NVIDIA CORPORATION & AFFILIATES. All rights reserved
.LP
This file is part of Slurm, a resource management program.
For details, see <https://slurm.schedmd.com/>.
.LP
Slurm is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under
the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free
Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option)
any later version.
.LP
Slurm is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY
WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS
FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more
details.

.SH "SEE ALSO"
\fBsacct\fR(1), \fBsalloc\fR(1), \fBsbatch\fR(1), \fBscancel\fR(1),
\fBscontrol\fR(1), \fBsqueue\fR(1), \fBsrun\fR(1), \fBslurm.conf\fR(5)