home | help 
UNTITLED()			      LOCAL			      UNTITLED()

NAME
     periodic -- run periodic system functions

SYNOPSIS
     periodic directory ...

DESCRIPTION
     The  periodic  utility is intended to be called by cron(8) to execute shell
     scripts located in the specified directory.

     One or more of the following arguments must be specified:

     daily    Perform the standard daily periodic executable run.  This  usually
	      occurs early in the morning (local time).

     weekly   Perform the standard weekly periodic executable run.  This usually
	      occurs on Sunday mornings.

     monthly  Perform  the  standard monthly periodic executable run.  This usu-
	      ally occurs on the first day of the month.

     security
	      Perform the standard  daily  security  checks.   This  is  usually
	      spawned by the daily run.

     path     An arbitrary directory containing a set of executables to be run.

     If an argument is an absolute directory name it is used as is, otherwise it
     is  searched for under /etc/periodic and any other directories specified by
     the local_periodic setting in periodic.conf(5) (see below).

     The periodic utility will run each executable file in the directory or  di-
     rectories specified.  If a file does not have the executable bit set, it is
     silently ignored.

     Each script is required to exit with one of the following values:

     0	   The	 script  has  produced	nothing  notable  in  its  output.   The
	   <basedir>_show_success variable controls the masking of this output.

     1	   The script has produced some notable information in its output.   The
	   <basedir>_show_info variable controls the masking of this output.

     2	   The	script	has  produced some warnings due to invalid configuration
	   settings.  The <basedir>_show_badconfig variable controls the masking
	   of this output.

     >2    The script has produced output that must not be masked.

     If the relevant variable (where <basedir> is the base  directory  in  which
     the script resides) is set to "NO" in periodic.conf, periodic will mask the
     script output.  If the variable is not set to either "YES" or "NO", it will
     be given a default value as described in periodic.conf(5).

     All  remaining  script  output  is  delivered  based  on  the  value of the
     <basedir>_output setting.

     If this is set to a path name (beginning with a `/' character),  output  is
     simply   logged   to   that  file.   newsyslog(8)	knows  about  the  files
     /var/log/daily.log, /var/log/weekly.log and  /var/log/monthly.log,  and  if
     they exist, it will rotate them at the appropriate times.	These are there-
     fore good values if you wish to log periodic output.

     If  the  <basedir>_output value does not begin with a `/' and is not empty,
     it is assumed to contain a list of  email	addresses,  and  the  output  is
     mailed to them.

     If <basedir>_output is not set or is empty, output is sent to standard out-
     put.

ENVIRONMENT
     The periodic utility sets the PATH environment to include all standard sys-
     tem directories, but no additional directories, such as /usr/local/bin.  If
     executables  are  added  which depend upon other path components, each exe-
     cutable must be responsible for configuring its  own  appropriate	environ-
     ment.

FILES
     /etc/crontab		  the  periodic  utility is typically called via
				  entries in the system default cron(8) table

     /etc/periodic		  the  top  level  directory  containing  daily,
				  weekly,  and monthly subdirectories which con-
				  tain standard system periodic executables

     /etc/defaults/periodic.conf  the  periodic.conf  system  registry	contains
				  variables   that   control  the  behaviour  of
				  periodic and the standard daily,  weekly,  and
				  monthly scripts

     /etc/periodic.conf 	  this file contains local overrides for the de-
				  fault periodic configuration

EXIT STATUS
     Exit status is 0 on success and 1 if the command fails.

EXAMPLES
     The  system crontab should have entries for periodic similar to the follow-
     ing example:

	   # do daily/weekly/monthly maintenance
	   0	  2	  *	  *	  *	  root	  periodic daily
	   0	  3	  *	  *	  6	  root	  periodic weekly
	   0	  5	  1	  *	  *	  root	  periodic monthly

     The /etc/defaults/periodic.conf  system  registry	will  typically  have  a
     local_periodic variable reading:

	   local_periodic="/usr/local/etc/periodic /usr/X11R6/etc/periodic"

     To  log periodic output instead of receiving it as email, add the following
     lines to /etc/periodic.conf:

	   daily_output=/var/log/daily.log
	   weekly_output=/var/log/weekly.log
	   monthly_output=/var/log/monthly.log

     To only see important information from daily periodic jobs, add the follow-
     ing lines to /etc/periodic.conf:

	   daily_show_success=NO
	   daily_show_info=NO
	   daily_show_badconfig=NO

DIAGNOSTICS
     The command may fail for one of the following reasons:

     usage: periodic <directory of files to execute>  No directory path argument
     was passed to periodic to specify where the script fragments reside.

     <directory> not found  Self explanatory.

SEE ALSO
     sh(1), crontab(5), periodic.conf(5), cron(8), newsyslog(8)

HISTORY
     The periodic utility first appeared in FreeBSD 3.0.

AUTHORS
     Paul Traina <pst@FreeBSD.org>
     Brian Somers <brian@Awfulhak.org>

BUGS
     Since one specifies information about a  directory  using	shell  variables
     containing  the  string,  <basedir>, <basedir> must only contain characters
     that are valid within a sh(1) variable name, alphanumerics and underscores,
     and the first character may not be numeric.

FreeBSD 6.1			November 28, 2001		     PERIODIC(8)
home | help