SPAWNing IDL from IDL under UNIX

["D. Mattes" <dmattes(at)u.washington.edu>]

hello IDL gurus:  here's a fun self-referential problem that i REALLY need
solved.  i have a lengthy minimization process coded using IDL.  what i
would like is to allow the user to use my widgets to set minimization
parameters, etc. and then spawn idl as a UNIX process which runs the
minimization.  

so i would use spawn to set the idl startup file:
spawn,'setenv IDL_STARTUP my_min_proc'

then, i would like to spawn idl as a unix process, using the unix 'at'
command:
spawn,'at now; idl; ^D'

the preceeding command starts idl using the specified startup file, but it
runs in the current terminal shell.  if i exit the shell, i lose the
process.

any insight into this issue would be greatly appreciated!

thanks,
david mattes