CiviCRM Community Forums (archive)

I can't seem to get cron working after my upgrade from 4.1.6 to 4.2.9. The Drupal version is: 7.22.

The server's cron email reports the following:

ERROR: You need to send a valid key to execute this file. More info at:http://wiki.civicrm.org/confluence/display/CRMDOC/Managing+Scheduled+Jobs

The key I'm using comes from civicrm.settings.php.

Here is the cron job I have been using (password and key have been changed from the real ones, "example.com" has been substituted here for the real site name).

/usr/bin/lynx -source https://example.com/sites/all/modules/civicrm/bin/cron.php?name=cividrupaluser&pass=axld506thedD3&key=c1fec16a3fc1479fd3150b1567b23139

(For those who know that lynx default settings have trouble with https, know that I've adjusted those settings and the problem is not related to lynx and https.)

Thanks,

Shai

Here is how I got it to work:

I couldn't get cron via http to work, so I tried the cli method.

I also tried this in a cron tab and and it returned the message, "You can only run cli from the command line."

/usr/local/bin/php /home/tsc/public_html/sites/all/modules/civicrm/bin/cli.php -u drupaluser-with-civiperms -p password

So then I created a script using exec, which emulates the command line. I called that file civicrm-cron.php. It's contents were:

<?php
exec('/usr/local/bin/php /home/tsc/public_html/sites/all/modules/civicrm/bin/cli.php -u drupaluser-with-civiperms -p password  -e Job -a execute');
?>

Then I created a cron job using this command: /usr/local/bin/php /path/to/civicrm-cron.php

That was the magic.

For anyone trying to use this recipe, note you need to replace drupaluser-with-civiperm with the username of a drupal user who has CiviCRM permission and of course replace "password" with the password of that person. In addition, "/usr/local/bin/php" is the path to php on my server, but the path might be different on yours. When I'm actually in the command line, I can just type "php" without the explicit path. But, at least on my server, "exec" isn't so smart and needed the explicit path.

One final warning. Your server administrator may not allow you to use the "exec" command in a script. It is often on a black list of php commands which are disabled for security reasons. You may be able to convince your server administrator to turn it back on.

Shai Gluskin

@Herschel,

1. I'm either not getting the joke you made, and feel stupid...

or

2. I'm not getting how you can use the php comment system to emulate the command line in a php script.

Either way I feel stupid. Either way please explain!

Shai