Answer: To launch a non-interactive command line IDL session to run a *.pro file (source code) program, you can use the -e command line switch for idl, as long as the *.pro file is in your IDL program search path. For example, for "filename.pro", if the program runs from the IDL> command prompt like: IDL> filename --then the non-interactive idl command might look like this: idl -e filename I'm not familiar with the "bsub" program so I'm not sure if the above idl command would be compatible with your bsub call For reference, here is a link to the documentation forthe "-e" command line switch: http://www.exelisvis.com/..._options_for.html#-e I hope this will be helpful. -Jim Harris