[arch-general] [arch-dev-public] Cron

[Heiko Baums]

Am Sun, 03 Jan 2010 23:23:28 -0500
schrieb Paul Mattal <paul at mattal.com>:

> Is there also an issue we're trying to solve with anacron? Can't we
> use bcron (or any other cron for that matter) and still use anacron
> separately?
> 
> I understand that fcron could theoretically do the work of both, but 
> don't see an inherent advantage over two separate tools which might
> each be better at their own job.

I again answer to arch-general due to write permissions.

I vote for fcron because it has dcron and anacron features. Two
separate packages is indeed a regression and not really KISS like
because anacron can only do anacron and dcron can only do dcron while
fcron can do both. And on a desktop system which doesn't run 24/7 you
need both features at the same time. On servers which run 24/7 it
doesn't harm if the cron daemon has anacron features, too.

I'm using fcron since years and it just works. It runs every cronjob as
soon as possible. If the system runs then it executes the cronjobs at
that time which is configured. If the system is down then fcron will
start the cronjobs as soon as possible, as soon as the system is up
again.

I don't know bcron and yacron but I doubt that they have anacron
features.

Also fcron supports the
directories /etc/cron.hourly, /etc/cron.daily, /etc/cron.weekly
and /etc/cron.monthly. So it's very easy to configure cronjobs. No
cryptical configuration file anymore. Just put a shell script into one
of these directories and they will be executed regularly. The old
configuration method is still possible.

Greetings,
Heiko