The "inotify cron" software is a system for monitoring file changes and scheduling periodic tasks in Linux. It uses the inotify API to track changes in specified directories and triggers cron jobs accordingly.
If you're looking for a new "inotify cron" system, you might want to check out incron. Instead of being driven by time periods like a regular cron, incron is driven by filesystem events. It comes with two programs: incrond, which is analogous to crond, and incrontab, which is like crontab.
To build incron, you'll need to modify the Makefile manually since this version is very early and doesn't contain a standard portable build mechanism. However, you might not need to change anything on many Linux systems. Before you type "make", make sure to review the Makefile and check for common variables like PREFIX.
Once you've built the files, you'll need to install them as root. Note that the installer creates a special user called "incron" to manage the incron tables.
To use incron, you'll need to run the incron daemon (incrond) under root, typically from a runlevel script. It loads the current user tables and hooks them for later changes. The incron table manipulator, on the other hand, can be run under any regular user since it SUIDs. You can use the same syntax as crontab to manipulate the tables, including importing a table, removing and editing the current table.
The user table rows have the following syntax: path, mask, and command. Path refers to the filesystem path (avoid whitespaces) while mask is a symbolic or numeric mask for events (see inotify.h and use commas to separate symbols). Command refers to the application or script to run on the events. You can use wildcards like $$, $@, and $# in the command for things like a dollar sign, the watched filesystem path, and the event-related file name.
For example, if you need to run program "abc" with the full file path as an argument every time a file is changed in /var/mail, you can use: /var/mail IN_CLOSE_WRITE abc $@/$#.
To build incron, you'll need to modify the Makefile manually since this version is very early and doesn't contain a standard portable build mechanism. However, you might not need to change anything on many Linux systems. Before you type "make", make sure to review the Makefile and check for common variables like PREFIX.
Once you've built the files, you'll need to install them as root. Note that the installer creates a special user called "incron" to manage the incron tables.
To use incron, you'll need to run the incron daemon (incrond) under root, typically from a runlevel script. It loads the current user tables and hooks them for later changes. The incron table manipulator, on the other hand, can be run under any regular user since it SUIDs. You can use the same syntax as crontab to manipulate the tables, including importing a table, removing and editing the current table.
The user table rows have the following syntax: path, mask, and command. Path refers to the filesystem path (avoid whitespaces) while mask is a symbolic or numeric mask for events (see inotify.h and use commas to separate symbols). Command refers to the application or script to run on the events. You can use wildcards like $$, $@, and $# in the command for things like a dollar sign, the watched filesystem path, and the event-related file name.
For example, if you need to run program "abc" with the full file path as an argument every time a file is changed in /var/mail, you can use: /var/mail IN_CLOSE_WRITE abc $@/$#.
What's New
Version 0.5.9: N/A