Date: Fri, 5 May 2000 21:53:41 +1000 From: "Doug Young" <dougy@gargoyle.apana.org.au> To: "Doug Barton" <DougB@gorean.org> Cc: "Jonathan Chen" <Jonathan.Chen@itouch.co.nz>, <freebsd-questions@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: "bad day_of_the_month" (yes really !!!) cron questions Message-ID: <004401bfb688$bb875800$847e03cb@ROADRUNNER> References: <018e01bfb62c$58481b00$847e03cb@ROADRUNNER> <20000505131420.A798@jonc.itouch.co.nz> <01aa01bfb632$612c3390$847e03cb@ROADRUNNER> <39125312.725B8355@gorean.org>
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Thanks for the comments ..... hopefully I'll get this issue under control now :) > You attached /usr/bin/crontab. Please don't get me wrong, but you > _really_ need to learn how to read man pages if you're going to have any > chance at all administering freebsd. The element you probably missed is > in the cron manpage where it tells you to go to crontab(5) to see the > format. That means that you use the following command: > Well I did try using try using the command literally, ie "crontab(5)", and only got a weird (and meaningless to me) error message. This illustrates one of the countless issues that causes untold aggro to those of us unfamiliar with the terminology. I guess I should take an active interest in the docs mailing list, its probably the only way to have an influence on fixing confusing info such as that. > What cron does is run the command you specify at the time you specify > it. The stuff on the left hand side tells cron when to run the command, > which you specify on the far right hand side. I got as far as understand that part, where I got bogged down is how to invoke mail so it actually sends ..... the only way I know to send mail from command line is using something like "mail blah@someplace.com <filename control-D", and I can't think of a way to convince the gremlins inside the machine to operate the keyboard ..... well thats how it was until a couple of the regulars were kind enough to send me sample mailing setups for crontab. > The easiest way to > accomplish what you want is to first write a script that does what you > want it to do (mailing the logs, and such). Then read crontab(5) to > figure out how to make it run when you want it to run. Thats OK if you know about writing scripts, but not a lot of use otherwise. As for reading stuff, most of us already have extremely high workloads, and I'm sure I'm not the only one in that position. I do read as much as possible, but unfortunately the docs are typically written by experts for other experts .... ie heaps of critical steps are missing. I've done some basic tutorial stuff for members of Apana, but its a significant addition to my already heavy workload producing HOWTO material for those less experienced plus trying to figure out the missing bits in documentation for things I'm not familiar with. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
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