running a script to delete files every sunday

jazzo · 04-10-2017, 02:12 PM

Hi guys, I'm trying to run a script on a folder to remove all the files every sunday at 23.00.
I've done a little bt of research, to find out what's involved etc, and what I got out of it is that I need to use cron to automate the process.
Needless to say I've never used it before o I had a look at a few examples and I came up with something, but I have no idea whether it is correct, so I was wondering if anyone could give it a quick glance.
Thi is the line of that will go in cron:

Code:

@weekly 00 23 * * 7 find /home/antobbo/Public-ubuntu-big -delete

The @weekly seems to indicate that it gets executed every week and I thought that adding time and date will do the rest. Am I on the right way?
thanks

michaelk · 04-10-2017, 02:23 PM

Code:

       @reboot    :    Run once after reboot.
       @yearly    :    Run once a year, ie.  "0 0 1 1 *".
       @annually  :    Run once a year, ie.  "0 0 1 1 *".
       @monthly   :    Run once a month, ie. "0 0 1 * *".
       @weekly    :    Run once a week, ie.  "0 0 * * 0".
       @daily     :    Run once a day, ie.   "0 0 * * *".
       @hourly    :    Run once an hour, ie. "0 * * * *".

The shortcuts replace the time and date fields. @weekly runs every Sunday at 00:00. Just use

Code:

00 23 * * 7 find /home/antobbo/Public-ubuntu-big -delete

rtmistler · 04-10-2017, 02:25 PM

logrotate(8) was designed for this purpose. It does not have to be log files, it can be any file. You can set it up to run weekly at the specific time you want and give it the files using wildcard or exacting names. You can also compress and rotate so as to retain the superseded files up to some chosen number of rotations.

jazzo · 04-11-2017, 03:30 PM

Oh I see, thanks guys, I will give it a go then, cheers

jazzo · 05-01-2017, 04:55 AM

right, this command

Code:

00 23 * * 7 find /home/antobbo/Public-ubuntu-big -delete

deletes the folder and not the files in it...how do I preserve the folder and delete files only?

pan64 · 05-01-2017, 04:59 AM

try to add for example: -type f (before -delete)

BW-userx · 05-01-2017, 07:48 AM

wouldn't just tossing a script it into cron.weekly on a Sunday and running it keep it running every Sunday too?

I only say this because I have a trim script tossed into weekly and it runs once a week. though I never marked the day I put it in there against when it actually runs. but it does run once a week, and I have not added it to a run job.

MadeInGermany · 05-01-2017, 12:16 PM

Delete recursively everything but the start-directory

Code:

00 23 * * 7 find /home/antobbo/Public-ubuntu-big -depth -mindepth 1 -delete

Or

Code:

00 23 * * 7 cd /home/antobbo/Public-ubuntu-big && find . -depth \! -name . -delete

sundialsvcs · 05-01-2017, 01:21 PM

"Kind pilgrim, heed thee, now, the most-wise admonition given thee by rtmistler in reply #3!"

logrotate is a tool that was specifically designed to deal with the inevitable accumulation of "historical files of any sort." It can do a lot of other useful things, too.

But it is smart about doing it. rm is ... not.

jazzo · 05-02-2017, 03:33 PM

thanks, I updated the script, will let you know how it goes as I'm off till sunday :-)!

Quote:

wouldn't just tossing a script it into cron.weekly on a Sunday and running it keep it running every Sunday too?

The way I understood it is that if you do that you can't decide the time, I may be wrong though

MadeInGermany · 05-04-2017, 03:27 AM

Yes, with both the @weekly and the cron.weekly mechanisms you cannot decide weekday and time.