Linux Cronjob Doesn't Work (Execute Script)

cronjob does not execute a script that works fine standalone

As seen in comments, the problem is that you are not defining what program should be used to execute the script. Take into account that a cronjob is executed in a tiny environment; there, not much can be assumed. This is why we define full paths, etc.

So you need to say something like:

1 * * * * /bin/sh /var/www/html/dbsync/dbsync.sh /var/www/html/dbsync
#         ^^^^^^^

/bin/sh being the binary you want to use to execute the script.

Otherwise, you can set execution permissions to the script and add a shell-script header telling it what interpreter to use:

#!/bin/sh

If you do this, adding the path of the binary is not necessary.

From Troubleshooting common issues with cron jobs:

Using relative paths. If your cron job is executing a script of some
kind, you must be sure to use only absolute paths inside that script.
For example, if your script is located at /path/to/script.phpand
you're trying to open a file called file.php in the same directory,
you cannot use a relative path such as fopen(file.php). The file must
be called from its absolute path, like this: fopen(/path/to/file.php).
This is because cron jobs do not necessarily run from the directory in
which the script is located, so all paths must be called specifically.

---

Also, I understand you want to run this every minute. If so, 1 * * * * won't do. Intead, it will run at every 1st minute past every hour. So if you want to run it every minute, say * * * * *.

Why does my bash script work in a terminal, but not when using crontab?

The user name precedes the command to run in the system crontab. Use

0 * * * * root /bin/bash /home/henry/yupdate.sh > /dev/null 2>&1

instead.

Cron script doesn't work unless called by sh command

The problem is your printf statement ... I'm fairly certain that you should also see error messages from rm in root's mail to the effect that e.g.:
1634986839.0000000000 Sun 24 Oct 2021 12:00:39 AM UTC /var/log/syslog.2.gz doesn't exist.

CronJob not running

Finally I found the solution. Following is the solution:-

1. Never use relative path in python scripts to be executed via crontab.
   I did something like this instead:-

   import os
   import sys
   import time, datetime
   
   CLASS_PATH = '/srv/www/live/mainapp/classes'
   SETTINGS_PATH = '/srv/www/live/foodtrade'
   sys.path.insert(0, CLASS_PATH)
   sys.path.insert(1,SETTINGS_PATH)
   
   import other_py_files
   

2. Never supress the crontab code instead use mailserver and check the mail for the user. That gives clearer insights of what is going.

---

Related Topics