[GRLUG] crontab not running a working script

[John-Thomas Richards]

On Thu, Jan 12, 2012 at 05:15:31PM -0500, Roberto Villarreal wrote:
> On Thursday, January 12, 2012 11:47:07 am John-Thomas Richards wrote:
> > I sync my box to memotoo.com's service.  Works from the commandline with
> > `syncevolution memotoo'.  The password is in the config files so when I
> > enter the above command, it syncs, then I'm back to a command prompt.  I
> > can take that command and put it in a simple bash script:
> > 
> >         #!/bin/bash
> >         syncevolution memotoo
> > 
> > 
> > It works as expected; no further input is needed.  However, when I put
> > that script into my crontab, I get this error message:
> > 
> >         Enter password for memotoo: [ERROR] error code from
> >         SyncEvolution fatal error (local, status 10500): could not read
> >         password for memotoo
> > 
> >         Synchronization failed, see
> >        
> > /home/jtr/.cache/syncevolution/memotoo-2012-01-12-11-38/syncevolution-log.
> > html for details.
> > 
> > The error log simply repeats that it could not read the password.
> > 
> > My scripting skills are limited; am I missing something?  If it works
> > from a commandline should it not also work from cron?
> 
> As a worst case (and is worst case as your eyes and brain may start bleeding), 
> you could use strace; it could likely give you a clue, if not the answer.

At the very least I like the challenge.

> Change your script to something like:
> #!/bin/bash
> strace 'syncevolution memotoo' > /tmp/strace.out 2>&1
> 
> and run your script manually.  Stash 's.out' away, then let cron call it.  
> Compare the two output files... they should almost certainly be different.  
> With luck 'diff' might be able to help, but at some point those logs should 
> differ in a non-trivial way, and that may hold a clue.
> 
> (Untested and not 100% if the shell redirection will work properly when under 
> cron, though I'm thinking it will, and may have to play with quotes (to ensure 
> it's the output of strace, and not syncevolution, that's being captures) but 
> using strace was really my point.)

Hmm...

jtr at auerbach ~ $ cat /tmp/strace.out 
strace: syncevolution memotoo: command not found
jtr at auerbach ~

Bleh.
--
john-thomas
------
There are two kinds of fool. One says, "This is old, and therefore
good."  And one says, "This is new, and therefore better."
John Brunner, science fiction writer (1934-1995)

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