What is the best method for running scheduled jobs in PHP?

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June 27th, 2012, 08:06 AM

mikemike27

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PHP-General - What is the best method for running scheduled jobs in PHP?

I have a webpage form that requires a date and time to be submitted. When it's submitted I need the back-end to run a script at the time and date specified.

Have you ever needed to do something like this? I've tried the exec() function with an at command inside. It won't work. I have no idea why and there doesn't seem to be a lot of advice on google about this. so either no one has ever had a problem with it before or no one has ever tried because there is a much simplier way.

I've also tried a shell script but I didn't really understand what I was typing. It was mostly a guess. Here it is;

Code:

$fileOutput = "#!/bin/bash\n\n";
$fileOutput.= "php ".$doc_root."/byot/author/publish_tables.php jobid=".$jobid." ".$result." catid=".$catid." docroot=".$doc_root;

$myFile = $doc_root."/byot/author/publishjob".$jobid.".sh";
$fh = fopen($myFile, 'w') or die("can't open file");
fwrite($fh, $fileOutput);
fclose($fh);

shell_exec('chmod a+x '.$myFile);

$fileOutput = "#!/bin/bash\n\n";
$fileOutput.= "at $publishTime $publishday.$publishmonth.$publishyear -f $myFile";

$runfile = $doc_root."/byot/author/runat".$jobid.".sh";
$fh = fopen($runfile, 'w') or die("can't open file");
fwrite($fh, $fileOutput);
fclose($fh);

shell_exec('chmod a+x '.$runfile);
exec($runfile);

Any tips or advice greatly appreciated!

June 27th, 2012, 08:13 AM

gw1500se

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If I understand what you are asking, I think you want to use the 'at' command from your PHP script.

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June 27th, 2012, 08:15 AM

mikemike27

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Quote:

Originally Posted by gw1500se

If I understand what you are asking, I think you want to use the 'at' command from your PHP script.

Yes, ideally. But when I put that in to an exec() it just doens't work. It doesn't come up with any kind of error, it just doesn't run.

Ideas?

June 27th, 2012, 08:27 AM

gw1500se

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The first step is to run the 'at' command from a command prompt as the user running httpd (e.g. 'sudo -u apache at ...'). There are some config issues at the OS level you need to set up to even use 'at'. Once you know 'at' works for that user, then you can debug the PHP end.

June 27th, 2012, 06:07 PM

E-Oreo

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I recommend setting up a batch/queue type structure to handle this.

Set up a database table that contains the tasks you need to run at a later date.

Then create a PHP script that reads the database table, fetches current tasks, and then executes them.

Use a CRON job to execute the PHP script frequently.

The advantages of this system are that it can survive a server restart / other interruption to your job handler and you also have a record of which jobs have/will run.

Comments on this post

aeternus agrees: great idea! this also prevents double execution, awesome

nocturns2 agrees: You can also add which jobs finished successfully. Great post.

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PHP-General - What is the best method for running scheduled jobs in PHP?

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