I think a pid file in /var/run is the right approach, maybe because that's what we do. You can easily have the cron print to stdout that it is dying because it sees the pid file of an earlier process. That stdout goes to the email address of the cron owner who always (well usually) pays attention to such things.
It is also problematic if your script dies without logging or otherwise informing you. It's not always possible, but you should try hard to make autononmous scripts log and generate nasty grams when things go wrong (by trapping signals, evaling things that could die, etc).
Phil
-
Are you posting in the right place? Check out Where do I post X? to know for sure.
-
Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags. Currently these include the following:
<code> <a> <b> <big>
<blockquote> <br /> <dd>
<dl> <dt> <em> <font>
<h1> <h2> <h3> <h4>
<h5> <h6> <hr /> <i>
<li> <nbsp> <ol> <p>
<small> <strike> <strong>
<sub> <sup> <table>
<td> <th> <tr> <tt>
<u> <ul>
-
Snippets of code should be wrapped in
<code> tags not
<pre> tags. In fact, <pre>
tags should generally be avoided. If they must
be used, extreme care should be
taken to ensure that their contents do not
have long lines (<70 chars), in order to prevent
horizontal scrolling (and possible janitor
intervention).
-
Want more info? How to link
or How to display code and escape characters
are good places to start.
|