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Any cron job can generate output. It may be log or error messages. Regardless of
the nature of the output, you may want to save this output to a file. This can
be done using the >
operator.
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To save the output from the cron job running the shell script to a file, use the following command:
* * * * * /bin/backup.sh > /bin/file.txt 2>&1
Let's break down this cron job:
/bin/backup.sh > /bin/file.txt
states that the output from /bin/backup.sh
will be redirected and saved in the /bin/file.txt
2>&1
states that the standard error (2>
) is redirected to the same file
descriptor that is pointed by standard output (&1
)One of the neat features of Cron is the ability to send emails when an error occurs during the execution of the cronjob. This can be done using the `MAILTO` environmental variable. When executing cronjob, any output is mailed to the owner of the crontab or to the user or email address specified in the `MAILTO` environment variable in the crontab, if such exists.
Cron is a command-line job scheduler on Unix-like systems. It allows you to run automated tasks in the background and it's especially useful for repetitive jobs.
Sometimes you may find that duplicate cronjobs are running at the same time. This may happen when the cronjob takes longer to complete than its execution interval. Here is a simple way to prevent this from happening ever again.
In this quick tutorial, we will take a look at how to set up a cron job to run at a specific time.