how to run crontab from php skript as a different user

[Frank R. Suchy]

Hi,

I want a php-script to maintain (some of) "my" cron jobs.

Therefore it has to modify some crontab.txt (no problem)
and has to execute crontab.

But since php runs as the apache-user it cannot run "my" crontab.

In general: Can a php-script run an external program under a different
user?

Thanx for any advise!
Frank

[Daniel Tryba]

Re: how to run crontab from php skript as a different user

Frank R. Suchy <usenet@rem.o ve-sp.am.ardik.net > wrote:[color=blue]
> Therefore it has to modify some crontab.txt (no problem)
> and has to execute crontab.
>
> But since php runs as the apache-user it cannot run "my" crontab.
>
> In general: Can a php-script run an external program under a different
> user?[/color]

Depends on your OS... on unix-like machines you might use sudo to do
this. But a more simple solution is to edit the crontab file from within
php and use the users cron to schedule reloads of the crontab file.

--

Daniel Tryba

[Frank R. Suchy]

Re: how to run crontab from php skript as a different user

Am Thu, 29 Jul 2004 23:49:36 +0000 (UTC) schrieb Daniel Tryba:
[color=blue]
> Frank R. Suchy <usenet@rem.o ve-sp.am.ardik.net > wrote:[color=green]
>> Therefore it has to modify some crontab.txt (no problem)
>> and has to execute crontab.
>>
>> But since php runs as the apache-user it cannot run "my" crontab.
>>
>> In general: Can a php-script run an external program under a different
>> user?[/color]
>
> Depends on your OS... on unix-like machines you might use sudo to do
> this.[/color]

Ehm, yepp, it's a Redhat Linux.
But I don't have root access or superuser privileges, so I can't use sudo.
I'm wondering whether there is some tool similar to sudo, which takes user
login and password in the commandline...
[color=blue]
> But a more simple solution is to edit the crontab file from within
> php and use the users cron to schedule reloads of the crontab file.[/color]

That's exactly what I currently do. But I don't want to reload the file
e.g. every hour just because maybe once in a week there is another job to
be done. But when there is such a job to be added this should happen quite
quickly, reloading the crontab once a day or so would be too seldom...

Frank

[Daniel Tryba]

Re: how to run crontab from php skript as a different user

Frank R. Suchy <usenet@rem.o ve-sp.am.ardik.net > wrote:[color=blue][color=green]
>> Depends on your OS... on unix-like machines you might use sudo to do
>> this.[/color]
>
> Ehm, yepp, it's a Redhat Linux.
> But I don't have root access or superuser privileges, so I can't use sudo.
> I'm wondering whether there is some tool similar to sudo, which takes user
> login and password in the commandline...[/color]

su propably can do the job, but not from the commandline... you'd have
to take a look a popen IMHO.
[color=blue][color=green]
>> But a more simple solution is to edit the crontab file from within
>> php and use the users cron to schedule reloads of the crontab file.[/color]
>
> That's exactly what I currently do. But I don't want to reload the file
> e.g. every hour just because maybe once in a week there is another job to
> be done. But when there is such a job to be added this should happen quite
> quickly, reloading the crontab once a day or so would be too seldom...[/color]

Have a job that looks for a special file every minute, if file exists
reload the crontab file and than remove special file. If crontab file
gets edited, touch the special file and within a minute the crontab
will be reloaded. Overhead is limited to a file exists test...

--

Daniel Tryba