Communities

Writing
Writing
Codidact Meta
Codidact Meta
The Great Outdoors
The Great Outdoors
Photography & Video
Photography & Video
Scientific Speculation
Scientific Speculation
Cooking
Cooking
Electrical Engineering
Electrical Engineering
Judaism
Judaism
Languages & Linguistics
Languages & Linguistics
Software Development
Software Development
Mathematics
Mathematics
Christianity
Christianity
Code Golf
Code Golf
Music
Music
Physics
Physics
Linux Systems
Linux Systems
Power Users
Power Users
Tabletop RPGs
Tabletop RPGs
Community Proposals
Community Proposals
tag:snake search within a tag
answers:0 unanswered questions
user:xxxx search by author id
score:0.5 posts with 0.5+ score
"snake oil" exact phrase
votes:4 posts with 4+ votes
created:<1w created < 1 week ago
post_type:xxxx type of post
Search help
Notifications
Mark all as read See all your notifications »
Q&A

Post History

66%
+2 −0
Q&A Modern and practical way to schedule tasks on a Linux machine that is not always on

What is a modern and practical way to handle scheduling tasks on a Linux desktop? Modern means basic features should not rely on obscure or convoluted commands and standards Practical means you...

3 answers  ·  posted 12mo ago by matthewsnyder‭  ·  edited 12mo ago by matthewsnyder‭

#3: Post edited by user avatar matthewsnyder‭ · 2023-12-08T05:06:00Z (12 months ago)
  • Modern and practical way to handle scheduling tasks on a Linux machine that is not always on
  • Modern and practical way to schedule tasks on a Linux machine that is not always on
#2: Post edited by user avatar matthewsnyder‭ · 2023-12-07T19:17:25Z (12 months ago)
#1: Initial revision by user avatar matthewsnyder‭ · 2023-12-07T19:17:09Z (12 months ago)
Modern and practical way to handle scheduling tasks on a Linux machine that is not always on
What is a modern and practical way to handle scheduling tasks on a Linux desktop?

* Modern means basic features should not rely on obscure or convoluted commands and standards
* Practical means you shouldn't jump through too many hoops to do basic things, it should be usable for 10-100 tasks
* I specify Linux desktop to emphasize that the machine will not be always on, and the approach should still work without that expectation

To be more specific, I want to schedule various things like run a script to check my email, check some sites I follow for updates, check for system updates, do backups. The schedule will usually be a cron-style date time period. When a job run is missed because the computer was not on, I will sometimes want it to be "caught up with" next time it is on, and sometimes to just be ignored, depending on the exact task.

There are some options that I know about, but in my opinion none are ideal. I will post them as separate answers to help add context.