Programs opening programs

Hi, I'm rather new to programming in C so I have a question for anyone...


I have a Data Acquisition (DAQ) card hooked up to my linux box. I have a program to read the inputs to the card and I am creating a menu-driven program to use the features of the board.

How can I have my menu program call the other program without closing the current program. I have been messing with the 'exec' commands from (unistd.h), but they close the current program.

Ideall, I would like to call the other program and have it run and exit in the background without closing the current program...

any ideas?

Thanks...

You're a genius! Thanks!