FCRON - README

 $Id: README,v 1.44 2001/11/04 18:55:01 thib Exp thib $

<-- fcron version 2.1.0 -->

Fcron is distributed under GPL license (please read the file LICENSE).

Project home page : http://fcron.free.fr/

Author : Thibault GODOUET <fcron@free.fr>


-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Note : The versions of fcron are of the form x.y.z .
----   Every versions where y is an odd number are *development* releases
       (i.e. 1.1.0 is a development release while 1.2.0 is a stable release),
       so they may contain more bugs (and uglier ones :)) ) than stable
       releases.

       Versions where y is an even number are considered as stable.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------


	What is fcron ?
	---------------

Fcron is a scheduler. It aims at replacing Vixie Cron, so it implements most
of its functionalities.

But contrary to Vixie Cron, fcron does not need your system to be up 7 days
a week, 24 hours a day : it also works well with systems which are
not running neither all the time nor regularly (contrary to anacrontab).

In other words, fcron does both the job of Vixie Cron and anacron, but does
even more and better :)) ...

To do so, fcron allows you to use the standard mode in which you tell
it to execute one command at a given date and hour and to make it run
a command according to its time of execution, which is normally the same as
system up time. For example :

	Run the task 'save /home/ directory'
	every 3h15 of system up time.

and, of course, in order to make it really useful, the time remaining until
next execution is saved each time the system is stopped.

You can also say :
	
	run that command once between 2am and 5am

which will be done if the system is running at any time in this interval.

Fcron also includes a useful system of options, which can be applied either to
every lines following the declaration or to a single line. Some of
the supported options permit to: 
 - run jobs one by one,
 - set the max system load average value under which the job should be run,
 - set a nice value for a job,
 - run jobs at fcron's startup if they should have been run
   during system down time,
 - mail user to tell him a job has not run and why,
 - a better management of the mailing of outputs ...


	Requirements
	------------

 - a Linux/Unix system
Fcron should work on every POSIX system, but it has been developed
on Mandrake Linux (so it should work without any problems on Redhat).
Fcron 2.1.0 has been reported to work correctly on :
	- Mandrake 8.0
	- Debian 2.2
	- LFS-2.3+ (take a look at http://archive.linuxfromscratch.org/lfs-hints/fcrond-hint.txt for the installation informations)
	- FreeBSD 4.2
	- OpenBSD 2.8
	- Solaris 8
	- AIX 4.3.3
(but should work on many more systems thanks to configure script)
Anyway, if you have troubles making it work on a POSIX system, please
contact me at <fcron@free.fr>.

 - a running syslog (or you won't have any log)
 - a running mail system (sendmail or postfix for example)
	(or users will not able to read their jobs output)
 - (optional) a PAM library.

	Compilation and installation
	----------------------------

See the INSTALL file.


	Configuration
	-------------

See the fcron(8), fcrontab(5) and fcrontab(1) manpages.


	Bug reports, corrections, propositions...
	-----------------------------------------

Please send me the description of any bug you happen to encounter (with, even
better, the corresponding patch -:) and any propositions, congratulations or
flames at
	<fcron@free.fr>
