crontab fails to change crontab file: "no changes made to crontab"
Igor Pechtchanski
pechtcha@cs.nyu.edu
Thu Oct 10 13:42:00 GMT 2002
Steve,
Before you do anything as drastic as a reinstall, check the inode of the
temp file before and after editing. Even though you're using vim, it can
be configured to make backups, and I don't know if the in-place write is
enabled when backup is. If the inode does change, look into your vim
configuration.
Igor
On Thu, 10 Oct 2002, Steve Holden wrote:
> "Harig, Mark A." <maharig@idirect.net> wrote:
> >
> > My assumptions were:
> >
> > 1. You are running NTFS as your file system on your disk. Is this
> > assumption correct?
> >
> Yes.
> > 2. You have set the CYGWIN environment variable to include 'ntsec
> > binmode', and that you set this variable's value using the Control
> > Panel's System applet. Is this assumption correct?
> >
> It wasn't, but it is now. After I'd done that I deleted /var/cron and
> reestablished it using /etc/postinstall/cron.sh.done
>
> Now the permissions look more comprehensible:
>
> sholden@COMPUTER ~
> $ ls -Rl /var/cron
> /var/cron:
> total 0
> drwxrwxrwt 2 sholden None 0 Oct 10 15:21 tabs
>
> /var/cron/tabs:
> total 1
> -rw-r----- 1 sholden SYSTEM 225 Oct 10 15:21 sholden
>
> sholden@COMPUTER ~
> $ ls -ld !$
> ls -ld /var/cron
> drwxrwxrwt 3 sholden None 0 Oct 10 15:20 /var/cron
>
> but unfortuantely crontab is still unable to edit the file it creates with
> the first crontab -e. I even tried adding group write permission to
> /var/cron/tabs/sholden, but that did no good either. I'm thinking
> "reinstall" here ...
>
> puzzled-ly y'rs - steve
>
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Steve Holden [mailto:sholden@holdenweb.com]
> > Sent: Thursday, October 10, 2002 2:48 PM
> > To: Harig, Mark A.; cygwin@cygwin.com
> > Subject: Re: crontab fails to change crontab file: "no changes made to
> > crontab"
> >
> >
> > "Harig, Mark A." <maharig@idirect.net> wrote:
> >
> > > Somehow, the cron.sh script did not get run during your
> > installation.
> > > Here is what it does:
> > >
> > > #!/bin/sh
> > >
> > > set -x
> > >
> > > if [ ! -d /var/cron ]
> > > then
> > > mkdir -p /var/cron
> > > fi
> > > chmod 1777 /var/cron
> > >
> > > if [ ! -d /var/cron/tabs ]
> > > then
> > > mkdir /var/cron/tabs
> > > fi
> > > chmod 1777 /var/cron/tabs
> > >
> >
> > Thanks very much for the response. A part of my debugging
> > work was to run
> > the /etc/postinstall/cron.sh.done script, which appears
> > substantially the
> > same. Anyhow, I removed /var/cron and ran your script, but I still see
> >
> > crontab: no changes made to crontab
> >
> > when I try to edit the crontab file. Note: the first crontab
> > -e creates my
> > crontab file with no problems. Crontab is simply (!) unable
> > to establish the
> > new version.
> >
> > I notice that the permissions this script attempts to establish aren't
> > actually being imposed:
> >
> > $ ls -Rl /var/cron
> > /var/cron:
> > total 0
> > drwxr-xr-x 2 sholden None 0 Oct 10 14:35 tabs
> >
> > /var/cron/tabs:
> > total 1
> > -rw-r--r-- 1 sholden None 229 Oct 10 14:35 sholden
> >
> > The permissions are essentially unchaged. I even logged in as
> > Administrator
> > and tried:
> >
> > chmod 1777 /var/cron
> >
> > but still no changes were made to the permissions. Does this
> > indicate the
> > error?
> >
> > regards
> > --------------------------------------------------------------
> > ---------
> > Steve Holden
> > http://www.holdenweb.com/
> > Python Web Programming
> > http://pydish.holdenweb.com/pwp/
> > Previous .sig file retired to
> > www.homeforoldsigs.com
> > --------------------------------------------------------------
> > ---------
> >
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: Steve Holden [mailto:sholden@holdenweb.com]
> > > Sent: Thursday, October 10, 2002 1:29 PM
> > > To: cygwin@cygwin.com
> > > Subject: crontab fails to change crontab file: "no changes made to
> > > crontab"
> > >
> > >
> > > I'm using a cygwin that I refreshed yesterday, on Win2K SP2.
> > >
> > > uname -a says: CYGWIN_NT-5.0 COMPUTER 1.3.12(0.54/3/2)
> > > 2002-07-06 02:16 i686
> > > unknown
> > >
> > > I installed the cron service following recommendations to include
> > > CYGWIN="tty ntsec". Cygcheck reveals that cron is version 3.0.1-7.
> > >
> > > Everything appears fine when I create my crontab file, and
> > > jobs do actually
> > > run. But then I'm not allowed to edit the file. I even
> > > deleted /var/cron to
> > > ensure correct permissions, and have tried both recreating
> > it with the
> > > postinstall script and letting crontab recreate it. No joy.
> > > The console
> > > session below is fairly typical.
> > >
> > > sholden@COMPUTER ~
> > > $ crontab -l
> > > /var/cron: No such file or directory
> > > /var/cron: created
> > > tabs: No such file or directory
> > > tabs: created
> > > no crontab for sholden
> > >
> > > sholden@COMPUTER ~
> > > $ crontab -e
> > > no crontab for sholden - using an empty one
> > > crontab: installing new crontab
> > >
> > > sholden@COMPUTER ~
> > > $ crontab -e
> > > crontab: no changes made to crontab
> > >
> > > sholden@COMPUTER ~
> > > $ ls -lRF /var/cron
> > > /var/cron:
> > > total 0
> > > drwxr-xr-x 2 sholden None 0 Oct 10 13:11 tabs/
> > >
> > > /var/cron/tabs:
> > > total 1
> > > -rw-r--r-- 1 sholden None 224 Oct 10 13:11 sholden
> > >
> > > >From a cursory reading of the source this look like a
> > > failure to rename the
> > > temporary file. What have I done wrong?
>
--
http://cs.nyu.edu/~pechtcha/
|\ _,,,---,,_ pechtcha@cs.nyu.edu
ZZZzz /,`.-'`' -. ;-;;,_ igor@watson.ibm.com
|,4- ) )-,_. ,\ ( `'-' Igor Pechtchanski
'---''(_/--' `-'\_) fL a.k.a JaguaR-R-R-r-r-r-.-.-. Meow!
"Water molecules expand as they grow warmer" (C) Popular Science, Oct'02, p.51
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