Setting Up Cron Job

Revision as of 05:11, 9 March 2013 by Patricia Schmidt (Talk | contribs)

NOTE!!! This page contains images which show settings examples for resources that are outside of our scope. If your settings are not same as the ones presented here, please contact your webhosting provider for further instructions

Overview of Cron Jobs

For JomSocial to run properly, you will need to set up a Cron job to run periodically. By unloading a processing task to a scheduled job, JomSocial will be able to run faster and smoother.

The Cron job is required to:

  1. Avoid excessive processing to send out system emails during a normal page load.
  2. Archive old activity stream logs that are no longer relevant.
  3. Convert uploaded videos to standardized .swf files.
  4. Perform optional administrative jobs such as remove old, unused photo album, which doesn't have any photos

Built-In Cron Job Option

Cron.jpg

Use this option if you are not using JomSocial video upload feature. By enabling this, JomSocial will process Cron on every page load, with an interval of five (5) minutes in between.

  1. This option will only process email-related Crons. It will not run any maintenance script, Amazon S3 transfer, or video conversion.
  2. Avoid this option if your site is heavy with concurrent users (10+ users at one time) because it may have effect on performance.
  3. Avoid this option if you enable video upload feature and rely on other Cronjob methods instead.

Cron on Linux Systems

On most Linux systems, you can simply run the commands below. We would recommend running the Cron every thirty (30) minutes or less. On a busy site, you might want to run it every ten (10) minutes. The more frequently you run it, the less load there will be on the server.

Lynx is a text-based browser that is installed in most hosting environments. If you do not have Lynx installed, you can use other alternatives such as wget, shown below:

Don't worry, this operation actually runs very fast and has very little impact on the server, equivalent to a normal single page load.

Note: When setting up this command, make sure you put in your full, valid domain name; 'localhost' will not suffice.

Setting Up Cron Job in cPanel 11

To add a new CronJob in cPanel 11, login to your cPanel and click Cronjobs under the Advanced section as the screenshot below.

Cronjob1.jpg

After clicking Cronjobs, you will be directed to a page similar to the one below. In this example, click Standard to proceed.

Cronjob2.jpg

Enter the following command in the Command to run field on the screen shown below it:

lynx -source "http://www.yoursite.com/index.php?option=com_community&task=cron" > /dev/null

Select Every Five Minutes, Every Hour, Every Day, Every Month, and Every Week Day so that the action above will be executed every five (5) minutes perpetually.
Cronjob3.jpg

Note: In order for the emails to be sent and videos to be converted, the scheduled task must be executed correctly.

Cron Jobs at GoDaddy

GoDaddy doesn't support cronjobs from the panel. Using an online cron scheduler (look below) should solve the problem.

Free Online Cron Scheduler

If you are still having trouble with the above options, use any free online Cronjob scheduler service available on the web. Do not worry on security because what these sites do is merely accessing index.php?option=com_community&task=cron at certain interval, which is open to anyone.

Popular services include:

Set CronJob
Cronless
Joomla Rafinery