/etc/cron.d Jobs not running every minute

Troubleshooting
1

Creating a bug report/issue

Required Information

  • DietPi version | cat /boot/dietpi/.version 8.19.1 (master, owner: MichaIng, G_LIVE_PATCH_STATUS=[applied,applied,not applied]
  • Distro version | echo $G_DISTRO_NAME $G_RASPBIAN bookworm 0
  • Kernel version | uname -a Linux DietPi 6.1.21-v8+ #1642 SMP PREEMPT Mon Apr 3 17:24:16 BST 2023 aarch64 GNU/Linux
  • Architecture | dpkg --print-architecture arm64
  • SBC model | echo $G_HW_MODEL_NAME or (EG: RPi3) RPi 3 Model B+ (aarch64)
  • Power supply used | (EG: 5V 1A RAVpower) 5V DC 3A
  • SD card used | (EG: SanDisk ultra) SanDisk Extreme 32GB

Steps to reproduce

I just have a bunch of test files in /etc/cron.d/

root@DietPi:/# for f in $(find /etc/cron.d -name 'test*.sh') ; do echo ==========; echo $f; echo $(ls -la $f); echo ----------; echo $(cat $f); done
==========
/etc/cron.d/test.sh
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 88 Jul 22 18:05 /etc/cron.d/test.sh
----------
*/1 * * * * root echo "Ufffi" $(date) >> /tmp/cron_d_test 
*/1 * * * * dietpi ERRRORRRRR
==========
/etc/cron.d/test4.sh
-rwxr--r-- 1 root root 77 Jul 22 18:06 /etc/cron.d/test4.sh
----------
*/1 * * * * echo "Ufffi" $(date) >> /tmp/cron_d_test4 
*/1 * * * * ERRRORRRRR
==========
/etc/cron.d/test2.sh
-rwxr--r-- 1 root root 89 Jul 22 18:06 /etc/cron.d/test2.sh
----------
*/1 * * * * root echo "Ufffi" $(date) >> /tmp/cron_d_test2 
*/1 * * * * dietpi ERRRORRRRR
==========
/etc/cron.d/test3.sh
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 77 Jul 22 18:06 /etc/cron.d/test3.sh
----------
*/1 * * * * echo "Ufffi" $(date) >> /tmp/cron_d_test3 
*/1 * * * * ERRRORRRRR

Also

root@DietPi:/# cat /etc/cron.hourly/test
#!/bin/bash
echo "UFFFF" $(date) >> /tmp/hourly_test
exit 1337

Expected behaviour

See a bunch of log files in /tmp. Also see error messages in journalctl -u cron as well as error mails being sent out.

Actual behaviour

Only the cron.hourly job seems to be running (/tmp/hourly_test is logged to every hour).
However, none of the cron.d jobs are running.

Extra details

I know that cron jobs for every minute are deactivated (/etc/crontab → /etc/cron.minutely). That is ok.
Still I would expect the test jobs in cron.d executed at least hourly.

I do see other jobs in /etc/cron.d being executed, though, which are not running every minute, but more on a daily basis.

I’m still kind of debugging the situation. Let me know if you need more info.

Cheers

2

Hello, my first guess is that you have to use absolute paths in the cron jobs, mabye it’s not working bc of that. E.g: /usr/bin/echo instead of echo.

So maybe you can change one of the scripts to

*/1 * * * * /usr/bin/echo "Ufffi" $(date) >> /tmp/cron_d_test 
*/1 * * * * /usr/bin/echo "ERRRORRRRR"

and test again.

There is a service cron.service which will check the files every minute and executes the jobs, if necessary.

3

I added the abs paths for the commands (/usr/bin/echo).

Still same: The minutely crons are not executed.

journalctl -u cron.service doesn’t list them either as being executed ever (other files in /etc/cron.d which e.g. run hourly ARE shown in the journal).

4

Well, I did find the reason.

Apparently the file extension *.sh was the issue. If I just name the file /etc/cron.d/test then it is interpreted by cron.service : )

2 Likes
5

See also here: run-parts(8) [linux man page]

6

Yes correct. The extension was causing the issue. You already found correct man pages.