topic Re: Cannot start a dterm or xterm window using crontab in Operating System - HP-UX

Cannot start a dterm or xterm window using crontab

PeterCh — Tue, 26 Jun 2007 23:10:04 GMT

Hi,

I am having problems doing the above in HPUX 10.20.
I want to run a job in an xterm window using crontab. In my crontab file I have added the line

00 12 * * * /tmp/test.sql &

In the file test.sql is the contents

. /home/oracle/.profile
xterm ..... -e top &

But at the cron job time, the xterm window does not pop up on the console. I have tried this with dtterm and it does not work either.
If I run the command /tmp/test.sql manually as the oracle user, it works, but it doesn't when I put it in the crontab file.
Any help is much appreciated. Thanks in advance!

Re: Cannot start a dterm or xterm window using crontab

Dennis Handly — Tue, 26 Jun 2007 23:21:54 GMT

Have you exported DISPLAY to the right value in your script?
Also your profile may test for being interactive and not set DISPLAY. So echo $DISPLAY after you source .profile.

Re: Cannot start a dterm or xterm window using crontab

PeterCh — Tue, 26 Jun 2007 23:41:37 GMT

Yep, that seemed to be the problem. Don't know how I missed that!
Thanks!

Re: Cannot start a dterm or xterm window using crontab

Reshma Malusare — Tue, 26 Jun 2007 23:46:26 GMT

Hi Peter,

Check out for DISPLAY variable.