I'm writing a script to backup some dirs such as /etc in a nightly backup.
The script works if I run it manually and input a password, but fails to launch in crontab
For testing purpose I've made a small script called script.sh in the ~/ it doesn't launch either.
script.sh
#!/bin/zsh echo "Salut tout le monde" >> echo.txt 2&> err.txt
sudo crontab -l looks like this
# m h dom mon dow command * 1 1 * * /home/jmaurice/backups/backup_monthly.sh * * * * * ./script.sh
ls -l script.sh
-rwxr-xr-x 1 jmaurice jmaurice 63 Aug 5 09:35 script.sh
journalctl --grep='cron' --no-pager --since='-1hour'
Aug 06 04:15:01 kali CRON[5481]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 04:15:01 kali CRON[5481]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 04:17:01 kali CRON[6456]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 04:17:01 kali CRON[6457]: (root) CMD (cd / && run-parts --report /etc/cron.hourly) Aug 06 04:17:01 kali CRON[6456]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 04:25:01 kali CRON[10350]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 04:25:01 kali CRON[10350]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 04:35:01 kali CRON[15257]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 04:35:01 kali CRON[15257]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 04:39:01 kali CRON[17217]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 04:39:01 kali CRON[17217]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 04:40:44 kali sudo[18107]: jmaurice : TTY=pts/0 ; PWD=/home/jmaurice ; USER=root ; COMMAND=/usr/bin/crontab -l Aug 06 04:41:10 kali sudo[18360]: jmaurice : TTY=pts/0 ; PWD=/home/jmaurice ; USER=root ; COMMAND=/usr/bin/crontab -e Aug 06 04:43:01 kali cron[971]: (root) RELOAD (crontabs/root) Aug 06 04:45:01 kali CRON[20342]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 04:45:01 kali CRON[20343]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 04:45:01 kali CRON[20342]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 04:45:01 kali CRON[20343]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 04:45:01 kali CRON[20343]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 04:46:09 kali sudo[20942]: jmaurice : TTY=pts/0 ; PWD=/home/jmaurice ; USER=root ; COMMAND=/usr/bin/crontab -e Aug 06 04:47:17 kali sudo[21509]: jmaurice : TTY=pts/0 ; PWD=/home/jmaurice ; USER=root ; COMMAND=/usr/bin/crontab -e Aug 06 04:48:01 kali cron[971]: (root) RELOAD (crontabs/root) Aug 06 04:48:01 kali CRON[21880]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 04:48:01 kali CRON[21880]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 04:48:01 kali CRON[21880]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 04:49:19 kali sudo[22512]: jmaurice : TTY=pts/0 ; PWD=/home/jmaurice ; USER=root ; COMMAND=/usr/bin/crontab -e Aug 06 04:51:01 kali cron[971]: (root) RELOAD (crontabs/root) Aug 06 04:51:01 kali CRON[23342]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 04:51:01 kali CRON[23342]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 04:51:01 kali CRON[23342]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 04:52:01 kali CRON[23829]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 04:52:01 kali CRON[23829]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 04:52:01 kali CRON[23829]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 04:53:01 kali CRON[24329]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 04:53:01 kali CRON[24329]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 04:53:01 kali CRON[24329]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 04:54:01 kali CRON[24839]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 04:54:01 kali CRON[24839]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 04:54:01 kali CRON[24839]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 04:55:01 kali CRON[25328]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 04:55:01 kali CRON[25329]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 04:55:01 kali CRON[25329]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 04:55:01 kali CRON[25329]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 04:55:01 kali CRON[25328]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 04:56:01 kali CRON[25815]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 04:56:01 kali CRON[25815]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 04:56:01 kali CRON[25815]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 04:57:01 kali CRON[26362]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 04:57:01 kali CRON[26362]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 04:57:01 kali CRON[26362]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 04:58:01 kali CRON[26847]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 04:58:01 kali CRON[26847]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 04:58:01 kali CRON[26847]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 04:59:01 kali CRON[27331]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 04:59:01 kali CRON[27331]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 04:59:01 kali CRON[27331]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 05:00:01 kali CRON[27846]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 05:00:01 kali CRON[27846]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 05:00:01 kali CRON[27846]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 05:01:01 kali CRON[28342]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 05:01:01 kali CRON[28342]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 05:01:01 kali CRON[28342]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 05:02:01 kali CRON[28827]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 05:02:01 kali CRON[28827]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 05:02:01 kali CRON[28827]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 05:03:01 kali CRON[29313]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 05:03:01 kali CRON[29313]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 05:03:01 kali CRON[29313]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 05:04:01 kali CRON[29796]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 05:04:01 kali CRON[29796]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 05:04:01 kali CRON[29796]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 05:05:01 kali CRON[30285]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 05:05:01 kali CRON[30284]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 05:05:01 kali CRON[30285]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 05:05:01 kali CRON[30285]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 05:05:01 kali CRON[30284]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 05:05:16 kali sudo[30396]: jmaurice : TTY=pts/0 ; PWD=/home/jmaurice ; USER=root ; COMMAND=/usr/bin/crontab -e Aug 06 05:06:01 kali CRON[30782]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 05:06:01 kali CRON[30782]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 05:06:01 kali CRON[30782]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 05:07:01 kali CRON[31267]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 05:07:01 kali CRON[31267]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 05:07:01 kali CRON[31267]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 05:08:01 kali CRON[31754]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 05:08:01 kali CRON[31754]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 05:08:01 kali CRON[31754]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 05:09:01 kali CRON[32242]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 05:09:01 kali CRON[32243]: pam_unix(cron:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0) Aug 06 05:09:01 kali CRON[32242]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root Aug 06 05:09:01 kali CRON[32243]: (CRON) info (No MTA installed, discarding output) Aug 06 05:09:01 kali CRON[32243]: pam_unix(cron:session): session closed for user root
script.sh should be running every minute, but I have no trace of it.
Anybody can point me to what I do wrong here ?
PS: this question has already been posted on askubuntu by mistake https://askubuntu.com/q/1480341/1717746
@Rohit Gupta I did 2 tries as below, separately of course, none of them went through still
> * * * * * /home/jmaurice/script.sh
> * * * * * ./home/jmaurice/script.sh
but thanks for your input anyway, I'm gonna try to put absolute paths in the script itself, but I don't think it'll change something
/etc" I wouldn't use root's crontab, I would use the system-wide crontab. I consider root's crontab a user's crontab (where user happens to be more powerful than other users, so what?), so I would use it for root's private jobs, like I use my regular user's crontab for my private jobs. If the backup is "officially" a part of the maintenance of the system itself then it should be in the system-wide crontab.