[SOLVED] Script for auto-audio-recording - Crontab

ctkroeker · 11-23-2006, 12:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tinkster

The hard part would be to stop the previous recording and make it save
the file with a given name. And the names suck, you can't sort those
chronologically, you should have YYYY-MM-DD-time.wav, not MM-DD-YYYY
(which is the most stupid convention anyone ever dreamt up :}).

Which software are you using for recording, anyway?

I'm using sound-recorder
So here is an example including you suggestion. Is it OK?

Quote:

00 02 1-31 1-12 0-6 sound-recorder -b 8 -c 1 -s 44100 -S 120:00 ~/audio/+%y-%m-%d-%k-%M.wav

How exactly do I format the +%y-%m-%d-%k-%M part so it does what I want? Or is it fine in it's current state?
BTW, maybe I schould put the command in a script so that I just have to modify the script if I need the command to change, right?

Tinkster · 11-23-2006, 09:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ctkroeker

I'm using sound-recorder
So here is an example including you suggestion. Is it OK?

How exactly do I format the +%y-%m-%d-%k-%M part so it does what I want? Or is it fine in it's current state?
BTW, maybe I schould put the command in a script so that I just have to modify the script if I need the command to change, right?

Code:

0 */2 * * *  /path/to/sound-recorder -b 8 -c 1 -s 44100 -S 120:00 ~/audio/`date "+%y%m%d-%k-%M"`.wav

should do.... chances are that sound-recorder isn't in the PATH of
cron, so a full path-name could be required.

Cheers,
Tink

timmeke · 11-24-2006, 02:28 AM

Just a minor detail, but for YYYY, you'll need %Y (instead of %y) in the "date" format.

XavierP · 11-24-2006, 05:05 AM

I have merged both your threads to keep the discussion in one place and to help people not to duplicate their ideas.

ctkroeker · 11-24-2006, 10:46 AM

OK, got it going. Just in case someone wants to know how I did it:
Here is my crontab ( I realize I could make it simpler, i.e: putting */2 by the hour entry, but I wanna be able to set stuff every two hours if I want to)

Quote:

#min hr dom mon dow cmd
* 0 * * * sh /home/server/.scripts/aircheck.sh
* 2 * * * sh /home/server/.scripts/aircheck.sh
* 4 * * * sh /home/server/.scripts/aircheck.sh
* 6 * * * sh /home/server/.scripts/aircheck.sh
* 8 * * * sh /home/server/.scripts/aircheck.sh
* 10 * * * sh /home/server/.scripts/aircheck.sh
* 12 * * * sh /home/server/.scripts/aircheck.sh
* 14 * * * sh /home/server/.scripts/aircheck.sh
* 16 * * * sh /home/server/.scripts/aircheck.sh
* 18 * * * sh /home/server/.scripts/aircheck.sh
* 20 * * * sh /home/server/.scripts/aircheck.sh
* 22 * * * sh /home/server/.scripts/aircheck.sh

and here is the aircheck.sh script it refers to:

Quote:

#!/bin/sh
#
/usr/bin/sound-recorder -b 8 -c 1 -S 119:59 ~/audio/$(date +%Y-%m-%d-%T).wav

Works great. The %T value in the filename puts in the exact time, resulting in a filename like this:
2006-11-24-13:42:45.wav

Thanks everyone for your input.

ctkroeker · 11-25-2006, 06:46 AM

OK, I'm having trouble. WHen cron starts on the hour, it records fine, but after arrounf 5 min. it stops, terminating the script. Any idea what I'm doing wrong?

crontab -l

Quote:

# m hr dom mon dow command
0 */1 * * * sh /home/server/.scripts/cron_job

/home/server/.scripts/cron_job

Quote:

#!/bin/sh
/usr/bin/sound-recorder -b 8 -c 1 -s 22050 -S 59:59 /home/server/audio/$(date +%Y-%m-%d-%T).wav

/var/log/syslog

Quote:

Nov 25 09:01:01 ubuntu /USR/SBIN/CRON[23238]: (server) CMD (sh /home/server/.scripts/cron_job)
Nov 25 09:01:01 ubuntu /USR/SBIN/CRON[23235]: (server) MAIL (mailed 119 bytes of output but got status 0x0001 )
Nov 25 09:08:11 192.168.0.248 -- MARK --

Tinkster · 11-25-2006, 12:27 PM

Try explicitly back-grounding the script? I've never seen cron terminating
any of my (even longer-running) scripts after a time. Does your recording
software have some flag for producing debug-output?

Cheers,
Tink

ctkroeker · 11-25-2006, 01:48 PM

Till now, the script always produced a 6.8MB file and terminated.
I tried running the script manually and it worked the way it's supposed to. Then I re-read this whole thread and thought that maybe I schould put in the number of seconds it was supposed to record instead of mins. into the script. Now it records double the time and stops again at double the size.

Quote:

#!/bin/sh
/usr/bin/sound-recorder -A /dev/dsp -c 1 -s 22050 -S 3600 ~/audio/$(date +%Y-%m-%d-%T).wav

BTW, there is no option for debug output in sound-recorder.
BTW 2, I tried arecord but it always gives me a error:

Quote:

server@ubuntu:~$ arecord -D /dev/dsp0
ALSA lib pcm.c:2143

snd_pcm_open_noupdate) Unknown PCM /dev/dsp0
arecord: main:547: audio open error: No such file or directory

This is getting quite frustrating...

timmeke · 11-27-2006, 02:27 AM

Again, just a small detail:
*/1 for the hour setting doesn't make much sense. Replace it by *, just to be sure.
Think of the "/n" operator as "any value that is divisible by n". Since all values are divisible by 1,
/1 can always be omitted. The 0 for the minutes will make sure it runs only once per hour.

Your problem most likely isn't caused by this, though.

ctkroeker · 11-27-2006, 04:24 AM

Tried all of that already to no effect. This is drving me nuts and I really want it soon.