Handle HTTP-requests that terminate the general workflow of HTTP

Question

I have a webserver that has a serverside handler per HTTP-GET and path. The return-value of the handler-function is the HTTP-response.

E.g.

String handleGetList (Params ps)
{
    String str = "<ul>";
    // ...
    str += "</ul>";
    retrun str;
}

Now think of a handler that should execute an axtion that terminates the server (e.g. shutdown, stop HTTP-server, ...).

How can I do so to have the action and also the response??

String handleTerminate (Params ps)
{
    system ("shutdown");   
    retrun "OK";
}

Shutdown before return would not send the response.

Response before shutdown would not executes the shutdown.

How to get both?

Sure I can set a marker for some external app that does the shutdown after the response is sent but maybe there is an easier way.

Answer 1

I did it now this way.

handler ()
{
   system ("sleep 3 && shutdown &");
   print "OK";
}

Because of & the system does not wait till it ends and with the sleep the whole handler can finish before the shutdown happens.