Cron Job Syntax

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Mischa Friegang

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May 13, 2019, 5:02:06 PM5/13/19
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I'm pretty new to linux and I'm trying to set up a cron job that resets a users password once a week. I know what the gam command would be, but it doesn't seem to be running the command on schedule. Any ideas as to what I'm doing wrong?
Here's what I have in my crontab file:  #46 1 * * 1  gam update user test@****.org password test1234
Do I need to point to my gam install under /home/usr/bin/gam?
Thanks in advance 

Ross Scroggs

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May 13, 2019, 5:26:53 PM5/13/19
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Mischa,

Yes, use the full path.

Ross

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Matthew Uribe

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May 13, 2019, 5:31:05 PM5/13/19
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Mischa,

It looks like your schedule will run at 1:46 am on day 1 (Monday) of each week. However, you have commented the line out, so it's going to be ignored. Try removing the # from the beginning of the line.

Matt

Mischa Friegang

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May 13, 2019, 5:48:08 PM5/13/19
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Whoops, you're right I definitely had it commented it out, thanks for the response. I have taken the comment out but i still does not seem to be running.  Where in the command would I want to point to my GAM installation? 

Eric Dannewitz

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May 13, 2019, 6:03:47 PM5/13/19
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gam

so you have to put your path to gam there

46 1 * * 1 /usr/local/gamadv-xtd/gam update user test password test1234

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Matthew Uribe

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May 13, 2019, 6:07:32 PM5/13/19
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Mischa,

Have you updated the schedule to cause it to have run just now? You could append something to the crontab so that it saves all of its output into another file, so that you can see if it's running, and what it's doing. Try updating your crontab entry as follows:

46 1 * * 1  gam update user test@****.org password test1234 > ~/cron.log 2>&1

After your scheduled time, the file cron.log in the user's home directory should contain all output from the command, standard and error. This way, if there's an error, such as "-bash: flam: command not found", then you'll know what the problem is.

As far as the path to the gam command, you might try "locate gam" or "which gam" to see where your gam install is. 

One final thought: I'm not sure which flavor of Linux you're using, or if it even matters, but in my experience, crontab expects a blank line at the end of the crontab file. Does your crontab file have a blank line at the end?

Matt

Mischa Friegang

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May 13, 2019, 6:33:18 PM5/13/19
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Yes I've tried it with current time, as well as adding the blank line at the end of the crontab. Here's what I'm trying now:  27 15 * * * home/usr/bin/gam gam  update user test@****.org password 1234 ~/cron.log 2>&1
I'm not seeing the log file getting saved anywhere. I am going to try with some more basic crontabs (not involving GAM, just basic text outputs) and move up from there. Thanks again for responding. You're leading me in the right direction 

Eric Dannewitz

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May 13, 2019, 6:34:57 PM5/13/19
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Incorrect. 

you need to change to

/home/usr/bin/gam 

NOT

/home/usr/bin/gam gam



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Mischa Friegang

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May 13, 2019, 6:42:27 PM5/13/19
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The second "gam" was the first part of the gam command, not the file path. Does the command not need to start with gam? EG: gam update user test@***.org password test1234   
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Ross Scroggs

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May 13, 2019, 6:45:01 PM5/13/19
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You want: 27 15 * * * /home/usr/bin/gam/gam  update user test@****.org password 1234 ~/cron.log 2>&1
I'm assuming that usr is a placeholder, replace with your actual user name

Ross


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Matthew Uribe

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May 13, 2019, 6:52:48 PM5/13/19
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Have you tried a "locate gam" or "which gam" to get the path to the executable? /home/usr seems a little unusual. Commonly, in Linux systems, there is a /home and a /usr, and it is entirely possible that there is a /home/usr, but it seems worth checking. 

The ~/cron.log should be in the user's home directory. Try "cd ~" and then "ls". You should see the cron.log file. If not, perhaps the ~/ shortcut does not work in the cron environment. Changing ~/cron.log to the full path for your user, such as "/home/usr/cron.log" might be necessary.

Eric Dannewitz

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May 13, 2019, 6:54:19 PM5/13/19
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all you need to do is

root@dvecgam01:~/CalendarBackups# gam

GAM 4.82.11 - https://github.com/taers232c/GAMADV-XTD
Ross Scroggs <ross.s...@gmail.com>
Python 2.7.16 64-bit final
google-api-python-client 1.7.8
httplib2 0.12.1
oauth2client 4.1.3
Linux-4.15.0-48-generic-x86_64-with-Ubuntu-18.04-bionic x86_64
Path: /usr/local/gamadv-xtd
Help: Syntax in file /usr/local/gamadv-xtd/GamCommands.txt
Help: Documentation is at https://github.com/taers232c/GAMADV-XTD/wiki

Gam tells you where it is (or at)

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Mischa Friegang

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May 13, 2019, 8:58:02 PM5/13/19
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I decided to check the system time on my google cloud VM that I use to run GAM and now I feel like an idiot. I should have checked to see what time the system was running off off instead of just using my local time. Turned out to be in a different time zone. It seems to be working as it should now. Thanks to everyone for the responses, I can't overstate how thankful I am for GAM and this community. Cheers 
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