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Cron on AIX
- Thread starter Learnr
- Start date
KenCunningham
Technical User
1. Yes
2. Yes. I paste the following into my crontab as a reminder as to what the order of fields is:
#Crontab field order:
#minute (0-59),
#| hour (0-23),
#| | day of the month (1-31),
#| | | month of the year (1-12),
#| | | | day of the week (0-6 with 0=Sunday).
#| | | | | commands
You edit the crontab using crontab -e and make entries like the following - based on the above:
00 11 * * 0-6 "<script to run>"
This runs the script at 11:00 am every day. Save your crontab using wq!, as in vi.
3. I see no reason why db2 shouldn't be the same as any other database. We use Oracle and make entries of the type:
00 11 * * 0-6 su - oracle -c "<script to run>"
which runs the script under the Oracle user id. You can of course make a crontab for user Oracle or whoever if that's what you prefer. Bear in mind that cron uses a very restricted environment, so it may be necessary to explicitly set environment variables ($PATH etc) within the script itself - this is a common gotcha.
Hope this helps and good luck.
2. Yes. I paste the following into my crontab as a reminder as to what the order of fields is:
#Crontab field order:
#minute (0-59),
#| hour (0-23),
#| | day of the month (1-31),
#| | | month of the year (1-12),
#| | | | day of the week (0-6 with 0=Sunday).
#| | | | | commands
You edit the crontab using crontab -e and make entries like the following - based on the above:
00 11 * * 0-6 "<script to run>"
This runs the script at 11:00 am every day. Save your crontab using wq!, as in vi.
3. I see no reason why db2 shouldn't be the same as any other database. We use Oracle and make entries of the type:
00 11 * * 0-6 su - oracle -c "<script to run>"
which runs the script under the Oracle user id. You can of course make a crontab for user Oracle or whoever if that's what you prefer. Bear in mind that cron uses a very restricted environment, so it may be necessary to explicitly set environment variables ($PATH etc) within the script itself - this is a common gotcha.
Hope this helps and good luck.
RodKnowlton
MIS
- Apr 26, 2000
- 1,005
It's also a good idea to backup the crontab before you change it, like so:
crontab -l > crontab.30jul2004
Then, if you want to revert to the backed up table, you can do:
crontab crontab.30jul2004
Rod Knowlton
IBM Certified Advanced Technical Expert pSeries and AIX 5L
crontab -l > crontab.30jul2004
Then, if you want to revert to the backed up table, you can do:
crontab crontab.30jul2004
Rod Knowlton
IBM Certified Advanced Technical Expert pSeries and AIX 5L
RodKnowlton
MIS
- Apr 26, 2000
- 1,005
'l' is also safely distant from 'd' on my QWERTY keyboard, unlike 'e'. Who among us has never had their fingers on the incorrect home row? 
I don't actually use 'crontab -e' at all. I make my backup, copy that backup to something like "crontab.new", edit it and then submit it with "crontab crontab.new". I know that -e is probably safe after I make the backup, but copying and editing confirms that the backup is good. Besides, I'm a belt and suspenders kind of guy when it comes to system modification.
Rod Knowlton
IBM Certified Advanced Technical Expert pSeries and AIX 5L
I don't actually use 'crontab -e' at all. I make my backup, copy that backup to something like "crontab.new", edit it and then submit it with "crontab crontab.new". I know that -e is probably safe after I make the backup, but copying and editing confirms that the backup is good. Besides, I'm a belt and suspenders kind of guy when it comes to system modification.
Rod Knowlton
IBM Certified Advanced Technical Expert pSeries and AIX 5L
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