Extend fabric.api.local to run commands in the background.

local.py

import subprocess

import fabric


def local(command, capture=False, shell=False, bg=False):
    if bg:
        if capture:
            with open("/dev/null", "w") as f:
                subprocess.Popen(command.split(), stdout=f, shell=shell)
        else:
            subprocess.Popen(command.split(), shell=shell)
    else:
        return fabric.api.local(command, capture, shell)

Worth preserving for posterity, but generally, this should be avoided. For web apps at least, Procfiles are preferable.