cron - Manage cron.d and crontab entries.

Synopsis

Use this module to manage crontab and environment variables entries. This module allows you to create environment variables and named crontab entries, update, or delete them.
When crontab jobs are managed: the module includes one line with the description of the crontab entry "#Ansible: <name>" corresponding to the “name” passed to the module, which is used by future ansible/module calls to find/check the state. The “name” parameter should be unique, and changing the “name” value will result in a new cron task being created (or a different one being removed).
When environment variables are managed: no comment line is added, but, when the module needs to find/check the state, it uses the “name” parameter to find the environment variable definition line.
When using symbols such as %, they must be properly escaped.

Requirements (on host that executes module)

cron

Options

parameter	required	default	choices	comments
backup	no		yes no	If set, create a backup of the crontab before it is modified. The location of the backup is returned in the `backup_file` variable by this module.
cron_file	no			If specified, uses this file instead of an individual user's crontab. If this is a relative path, it is interpreted with respect to /etc/cron.d. (If it is absolute, it will typically be /etc/crontab). Many linux distros expect (and some require) the filename portion to consist solely of upper- and lower-case letters, digits, underscores, and hyphens. To use the `cron_file` parameter you must specify the `user` as well.
day	no	*		Day of the month the job should run ( 1-31, , /2, etc ) aliases: dom
disabled (added in 2.0)	no			If the job should be disabled (commented out) in the crontab. Only has effect if state=present
env (added in 2.1)	no	no	yes no	If set, manages a crontab's environment variable. New variables are added on top of crontab. "name" and "value" parameters are the name and the value of environment variable.
hour	no	*		Hour when the job should run ( 0-23, , /2, etc )
insertafter (added in 2.1)	no			Used with `state=present` and `env`. If specified, the environment variable will be inserted after the declaration of specified environment variable.
insertbefore (added in 2.1)	no			Used with `state=present` and `env`. If specified, the environment variable will be inserted before the declaration of specified environment variable.
job	no			The command to execute or, if env is set, the value of environment variable. The command should not contain line breaks. Required if state=present. aliases: value
minute	no	*		Minute when the job should run ( 0-59, , /2, etc )
month	no	*		Month of the year the job should run ( 1-12, , /2, etc )
name	no			Description of a crontab entry or, if env is set, the name of environment variable. Required if state=absent. Note that if name is not set and state=present, then a new crontab entry will always be created, regardless of existing ones.
reboot	no	no	yes no	If the job should be run at reboot. This option is deprecated. Users should use special_time.
special_time (added in 1.3)	no		reboot yearly annually monthly weekly daily hourly	Special time specification nickname.
state	no	present	present absent	Whether to ensure the job or environment variable is present or absent.
user	no	root		The specific user whose crontab should be modified.
weekday	no	*		Day of the week that the job should run ( 0-6 for Sunday-Saturday, *, etc ) aliases: dow

Examples

# Ensure a job that runs at 2 and 5 exists.
# Creates an entry like "0 5,2 * * ls -alh > /dev/null"
- cron:
    name: "check dirs"
    minute: "0"
    hour: "5,2"
    job: "ls -alh > /dev/null"

# Ensure an old job is no longer present. Removes any job that is prefixed
# by "#Ansible: an old job" from the crontab
- cron:
    name: "an old job"
    state: absent

# Creates an entry like "@reboot /some/job.sh"
- cron:
    name: "a job for reboot"
    special_time: reboot
    job: "/some/job.sh"

# Creates an entry like "PATH=/opt/bin" on top of crontab
- cron:
    name: PATH
    env: yes
    value: /opt/bin

# Creates an entry like "APP_HOME=/srv/app" and insert it after PATH
# declaration
- cron:
    name: APP_HOME
    env: yes
    value: /srv/app
    insertafter: PATH

# Creates a cron file under /etc/cron.d
- cron:
    name: yum autoupdate
    weekday: 2
    minute: 0
    hour: 12
    user: root
    job: "YUMINTERACTIVE: 0 /usr/sbin/yum-autoupdate"
    cron_file: ansible_yum-autoupdate

# Removes a cron file from under /etc/cron.d
- cron:
    name: "yum autoupdate"
    cron_file: ansible_yum-autoupdate
    state: absent

# Removes "APP_HOME" environment variable from crontab
- cron:
    name: APP_HOME
    env: yes
    state: absent

Status

This module is flagged as preview which means that it is not guaranteed to have a backwards compatible interface.

For help in developing on modules, should you be so inclined, please read Community Information & Contributing, Testing Ansible and Developing Modules.

© 2012–2018 Michael DeHaan
© 2018–2019 Red Hat, Inc.
Licensed under the GNU General Public License version 3.
https://docs.ansible.com/ansible/2.4/cron_module.html

Docs

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