Cron Job

[Neville]

My web site hosting runs a script that sends a renewal to members before their account expires.
I need to run a cron job but in control panel it asks for an email address to send the cron output to.
Does this mean I will receive a copy of the email or will the reminder come to me only?

[eUKhost.com]

Originally Posted by Neville

My web site hosting runs a script that sends a renewal to members before their account expires.
I need to run a cron job but in control panel it asks for an email address to send the cron output to.
Does this mean I will receive a copy of the email or will the reminder come to me only?

Cronjob will send a notification to you once the cron is successfully executed. Reminders will be sent to all those who are your subscribed to the list which will be executed by cron.

[Neville]

How fast was that? woow and thanks

[eUKhost.com]

Originally Posted by Neville

How fast was that? woow and thanks

Luckily I logged in on forum at that time and your post was first that I came across

[DPS Computing]

All my notifications have been set to go to my main account address. The notifications are quite useful as if the cron starts to fail you get warned that this is happening and are therefore able to sort it out as quickly as possible. This is especially useful when they are performing a critical function such as what you are carrying out here.

[Neville]

Thanks Dave my first test should show up in a day or so

[DPS Computing]

Originally Posted by Neville

Thanks Dave my first test should show up in a day or so

Cool, make sure you look at the first email it sends you as this is the most critical as most problems that occur with crons occur because their misconfigured or broken. After its worked well once it generally carries on doing so.

The other thing to check that even if cron job runs successfully test that the actual action you wanted it to take has occurred. The cron may run successfully but that does not mean what it has ran has completed successfully.

Also make sure you don't set the cron frequency too high (too shorter time) as this can overload your account.

Hope that helps .

[jc8654]

Cron jobs are definately useful for things like billing systems or other programs that require regular action e.g. generating invoices etc. It is always about getting the balance right between making sure the system is efficient but not overloading the server, particularly if it is a large job which needs to be run.

[DPS Computing]

Originally Posted by jc8654

Cron jobs are definately useful for things like billing systems or other programs that require regular action e.g. generating invoices etc. It is always about getting the balance right between making sure the system is efficient but not overloading the server, particularly if it is a large job which needs to be run.

Especially if your sharing a server - as overloading the server will obviously make other customers on the same server unhappy.

[jc8654]

Originally Posted by DPS Computing

Especially if your sharing a server - as overloading the server will obviously make other customers on the same server unhappy.

Which could lead to you being suspended unless you sort the problem out. But that's a last measure and would need a really intensive Cron to be running.