Some sort of progress output for dd

gistfile1.txt

## Run dd in the background and save it's PID in the pid variable. Increase the bs if needed.
## Replace the "source" and "destination" of course!
 
dd if=source of=destination bs=4M & pid=$!
 
 
## It should give you your shell back. When it does, run the code below.
 
while ((pid)); do kill -USR1 "$pid" 2>/dev/null || break; sleep 5; done
 
## OR
 
until ((! pid)); do kill -USR1 "$pid" 2>/dev/null || break; sleep 5; done
 
 
## The while/until loop check's if "$pid" is not empty, then run kill every 5 seconds.
## Run 'dd --help | tail -n 19' for some info about the kill part.
## Question: Why do i have to do that when i can install dd_rescue or pv so i can have some fancy output?
## Answer: If you're doing some rescue/saving your system using some limited tools, then good luck guessing when will it finish!
## Other than that... just sit back, watch and enjoy!

Upate:
  The latest dd from openSUSE Leap 15.0 has some new option [ dd (coreutils) 8.29 ]
   
  status=progress
  oflag=sync
  
Add those options when running dd and voila!