How to add entries to cron through a script

[pverma]

Hi,

I want my program to run like this:

a)The webmaster adds a PHP script to cron through the CPanel GUI to run at a fixed time, say 10:00 AM every morning.
b)When the script is run by cron, it reads an XML file which was added in by the webmaster and contains a list of programs (other PHP scripts) to run at various times during the day
c)The PHP script adds each of the programs in the XML file to cron and sets them to run at the specified time.

How can I accomplish (c)? In other words, how can my php script tell CPanel to add some commands to be run at specific times during the day.

Any pointers will be appreciated and are most welcome.

-pv

 

[brianoz]

Check out the manual page for cron(1) and crontab. Essentially you need to parse the times into crontab format and feed them into crontab1) using "crontab < file".

http://forums.cpanel.net/showthread.php?t=66149

 

[pverma]

Yes, but how to do it using a CPanel API?

The issue is that my web host might hide the crontab file from me, but allow me to make cron settings through CPanel only.

 

[brianoz]

That doesn't make sense. If they hid it from you, they'd hide it from cpanel (ie the user interface_. The behind the scenes stuff I mentioned above won't be hidden from you ever in normal circumstances.