Hello

I have set up my crontab and whilst Im logged in and it works (It runs my shell script), however when Im not logged in, the script does not run.

Initially I set the time/date to 0 0 * * * (Midnight every day), as this did not work, I tested it with to 0 * * * * (every hour) whilst logged in and the script starts.

I use crontab -e to set it up under the root account..

Im sure you dont have to be logged in for it to run?, but maybe im missing a step or just overdosing on Linux and need a holiday:-)

any suggestions would be great

Dee

Which crontab are you running?
Any errors in the logfiles?

Hi Dee

You should source your ~/.bashrc or ~/.bash_profile file first in which the PATH environmental variable will get set for the binary PATHs.

By default the crontab will look for the binary in /usr/bin:/bin and if your script calls the binary that are in differen path(type #echo $PATH) then it ends up and cant finish off the job.

if you are executing bash script with the crontab you can add the following in the top of the script

. ~/.bashrc
. ~/.bash_profile

if you are executing some other script like perl or some other scripts, then you need to have a bash script in the crontab which sources the profile and RC file and then execute the perl or other script

Example:
#vi bash_script.sh
. ~/.bashrc
. ~/.bash_profile
perl otherscript.pl or someinterpreter otherscript

Regards
Rajiv

The script runs, but maybe it doesn't work as expected since it lacks something which is set upon login. Maybe does it requires an active DISPLAY?

As previously suggested check the logs to find out, e.g. /var/log/cron or /var/log/messages. Also check the root's mailbox using the mail command, since standard output and standard error (not redirected to a file) are sent there by the cron daemon (specifically to the crontab owner's mailbox).