From owner-freebsd-questions Thu Jun 27 09:11:51 1996 Return-Path: owner-questions Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.5/8.7.3) id JAA08096 for questions-outgoing; Thu, 27 Jun 1996 09:11:51 -0700 (PDT) Received: from watson.grauel.com (watson.grauel.com [199.233.104.36]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.5/8.7.3) with ESMTP id JAA08085 for ; Thu, 27 Jun 1996 09:11:47 -0700 (PDT) Received: from sparcmill.grauel.com (sparcmill.grauel.com [199.233.104.34]) by watson.grauel.com (8.7.5/8.7.3) with SMTP id LAA00427; Thu, 27 Jun 1996 11:19:17 -0500 (EST) Received: by sparcmill.grauel.com (SMI-8.6/SMI-SVR4) id LAA18858; Thu, 27 Jun 1996 11:10:26 -0500 Date: Thu, 27 Jun 1996 11:10:26 -0500 From: rjk@sparcmill.grauel.com (Richard J Kuhns) Message-Id: <199606271610.LAA18858@sparcmill.grauel.com> To: "M.R.Murphy" Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: The crontab controversy In-Reply-To: <199606271520.IAA20509@meerkat.mole.org> References: <199606271520.IAA20509@meerkat.mole.org> Sender: owner-questions@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk M. R. Murphy writes: > > > Should we: > > > > > > 1. Declare the ATT method the winner. > > > 2. Declare the BSD method (the REAL original crontab) the winner. > > > 3. Make the installation program remove one or the other at install > > > (put /var/cront/tabs/root in with the same actions as /etc/crontab > > > and have the install remove one or the other) > > > 4. Ignore the problem and trap the users/admins? > > > > > > > In order of preference, 1 3 2 4. > > > > Method 1 (/var/cron/tabs/*) offers the greatest versatility and > > consistency; it's sole disadvantage, as far as I can see, is that it > > requires root to execute one additional commmand when changing the system > > crontab file: "crontab new_crontab". I'd even be willing to argue that > > this is a Good Thing. Furthermore, a crontab file is a crontab file is a > > crontab file. This makes it easier to write a script that (syntactically) > > verifies crontab files before installing them. > > Before making such a decision, it might be a good thing to > > 1. man cron > 2. man 1 crontab > 3. man 5 crontab > 4. cat /etc/crontab > I've read them all. > and understand the reasons that cron is now the way that it is. So what are they? I still see NO reason for using 2 different formats by default, and the "/var/cron/tabs" method is more versatile than the monolithic "/etc/crontab" method. -- Rich Kuhns rjk@grauel.com PO Box 6249 Tel: (317)477-6000 x319 100 Sawmill Road Lafayette, IN 47903