None of my Cron jobs are running and when I looked to see if cron was running it seems that it is not

# ps -ef |grep cron
root 3287 3214 0 May07 pts/2 00:00:00 grep cron
#

I tried to start cron and this is what I get

# /etc/init.d/crond start
Starting crond: execvp: No such file or directory
0G[;31mFAILED;39m]
#




# cat /proc/version
Linux version 2.6.9-89.ELsmp (mockbuild@hs20-bc1-2.build.redhat.com) (gcc versio
n 3.4.6 20060404 (Red Hat 3.4.6-11)) #1 SMP Mon Apr 20 10:34:33 EDT 2009
# cat /etc/*-release
Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES release 4 (Nahant Update 8)

You'd have to view the /etc/init.d/crond to determine where it is calling execvp and also see if this is something defined within the script.

The error is telling you it is trying to run execvp but that can't be found (either because it doesn't exist/isn't defined or because it is not in the PATH searched. Most startup scripts don't rely on user PATH to find things.

RHEL4 is extremely old and no longer supported by RedHat - you really ought to consider moving up to RHEL6 (or at least RHEL5) unless your applications don't support the newer RHEL versions. If that is the case you should consider replacing your apps because they are NOT really supported either.

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#! /bin/bash
#
# crond Start/Stop the cron clock daemon.
#
# chkconfig: 2345 90 60
# description: cron is a standard UNIX program that runs user-specified \
# programs at periodic scheduled times. vixie cron adds a \
# number of features to the basic UNIX cron, including better \
# security and more powerful configuration options.
# processname: crond
# config: /etc/crontab
# pidfile: /var/run/crond.pid

# Source function library.
. /etc/init.d/functions
. /etc/sysconfig/crond
t=${CRON_VALIDATE_MAILRCPTS:-UNSET}
[ "$t" != "UNSET" ] && export CRON_VALIDATE_MAILRCPTS="$t"

# See how we were called.

prog="crond"

start() {
echo -n $"Starting $prog: "
if [ -e /var/lock/subsys/crond ]; then
if [ -e /var/run/crond.pid ] && [ -e /proc/`cat /var/run/crond.pid`
]; then
echo -n $"cannot start crond: crond is already running.";
failure $"cannot start crond: crond already running.";
echo
return 1
fi
fi
daemon crond $CRONDARGS
RETVAL=$?
echo
[ $RETVAL -eq 0 ] && touch /var/lock/subsys/crond;
return $RETVAL
}

stop() {
echo -n $"Stopping $prog: "
if [ ! -e /var/lock/subsys/crond ]; then
echo -n $"cannot stop crond: crond is not running."
failure $"cannot stop crond: crond is not running."
echo
return 1;
fi
killproc crond
RETVAL=$?
echo
[ $RETVAL -eq 0 ] && rm -f /var/lock/subsys/crond;
return $RETVAL
}

rhstatus() {
status crond
}

restart() {
stop
start
}

reload() {
echo -n $"Reloading cron daemon configuration: "
killproc crond -HUP
RETVAL=$?
echo
return $RETVAL
}

case "$1" in
start)
start
;;
stop)
stop
;;
restart)
restart
;;
reload)
reload
;;
status)
rhstatus
;;
condrestart)
[ -f /var/lock/subsys/crond ] && restart || :
;;
*)
echo $"Usage: $0 {start|stop|status|reload|restart|condrestart}"
exit 1
esac

[QUOTE=MensaWater;5166955]You'd have to view the /etc/init.d/crond



I posted /etc/init.d/crond file



# find / -name crond
/var/lock/subsys/crond
/etc/sysconfig/crond
/etc/rc.d/init.d/crond
/etc/pam.d/crond

OK execvp is a C function call (type "man execvp").

The error is saying that when it runs the crond binary there is some file that is trying to open that doesn't exist.

By default crond is looking to load the files from /var/spool/cron for each user that has a crontab. Is there a /var/spool/cron/root on your system?

Is there a /var/spool/cron/root on your system?[/QUOTE]

Yes,

# l /var/spool/cron/root
-rw------- 1 root root 244 May 2 14:16 /var/spool/cron/root

In the file it has all my Cron Jobs

Try stopping crond (service crond stop) then manually start it with "strace /usr/sbin/crond" to see if you can determine which missing file it is complaining about. Look for the "execvb" line in the strace output and if none found look for other "exec", "open" and "access" lines.

Note that this may actually succeed in starting crond so you'd have to stop it again before trying to restart with the init script.

Looks more like the /usr/sbin/crond daemon doesn't exist.

I think you will have force a reinstall the cron package.

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I was looking up on how to re-install, but i am at a loss. Can you point me in the right direction for installing Cron...

You'd use "up2date" on RHEL4 to install or update packages. (This was replaced by yum in RHEL5 and later.)

upt2date talks to the RedHat repositories so you'd have to have a subscription with RedHat for that to work. I don't know if they're still maintaining repositories for RHEL4 though because it is end of life.

If you still have the RHEL4 install media you might be able to extract it from that.

Having trouble with the up2date command, is there a way to up date the cron file with out using that?

On RHEL4/RHEL5 the package name is "vixie-cron". As noted before you may be able to find that on the install CD.

You can download it from RedHat's download site at:
https://access.redhat.com/site/downloads/
Choose "Packages" there and search for the vixie-cron packcage.

Run "uname -p" first to determine if you're running x86_64, i386 (or i586 or i686). If the former make sure you get the x86_64 (which is 64 bit) package otherwise get the appropriate for the latter (which are 32 bit under IA 32).

The above requires a login to RedHat's site.

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# rpm -i -a vixie-cron-4.1-58.el4.i386.rpm
file /etc/pam.d/crond from install of vixie-cron-4.1-58.el4 conflicts with file
from package vixie-cron-4.1-57.el4
file /usr/bin/crontab from install of vixie-cron-4.1-58.el4 conflicts with file
from package vixie-cron-4.1-57.el4
file /usr/sbin/crond from install of vixie-cron-4.1-58.el4 conflicts with file f
rom package vixie-cron-4.1-57.el4

# service crond restart
Stopping crond: 0G[;31mFAILED;39m]
Starting crond: execvp: No such file or directory
0G[;31mFAILED;39m]

First remove (rpm -e) the package vixie-cron-4.1-57.

Then install the new one.

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Or try using the update (-U) flag for rpm instead of install (-i):

rpm -Uvh vixie-cron-4.1-58.el4.i386.rpm

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