cron fail to run

UNIX for Advanced & Expert Users
1

Hi,
Does anyone know why the cron job fail to run automatically ?
We have the problem with some Solaris 2.5.1 Machine !
The cron seemd to fail to submit the jobs defined at the defined time !!
Why ?
Sometime it runs OK,but sometime it fail .
We are very sure the problem is due to cron no ok,because other machines with the same cronjobs
run well !!

2

Hard to help you without at least seeing your file.

(The amount of help you will get from the unix community will directly depend on how much information you provide in your questions).

Are you specifying the command as a just a command or the fully qualified pathname ? If not, I would suggest that you specify the full command path including /usr/.... whatever.

Also try running it on the command line yourself manually when you think it did not run.

What makes you think that it is running or not running sometimes ?

3

Hi,
Thanks for quick reply !!
" What makes you think that it is running or not running sometimes ? "
The full crontable fail sometimes,but usually it runs OK !!

4

Might you post your crontab listing (crontab -l) to allow us a better view?

5

HI,

hp93k_3(asx)[home/asx]% crontab -l
#Kerwin Update
3,18,33,48 * * * * /home/asx/bin/auto_send_hp93k.sh

6

Try the following to get more detail...

3,18,33,48 * * * * /home/asx/bin/auto_send_hp93k.sh 2> /home/asx/autosenderror.log

This will output any (if any) error messages to the log file.

7

Some possibilities:

  1. Running out of disk space
  2. Running out of max processes
  3. Someone tweaking the file or removing jobs, etc. changing stuff without your knowledge
  4. Full moon :wink:

I think log dump suggestion by Cameron should give you better clues!