background script

mcalpine

how do i get a script to run continuously...?
eg: if i want a calendar type thing that constantly runs and checks for entries in the current hour and then notifies me by email that i have a meeting or whatever....?

thanks

Kudose

A never ending script:

$count = 1;
while ($count = 1){

echo "This is neverending! <br>";

}
?>

It is never ending becuase $count is always 1 since you didnt include $count++;

Joe826

I don't think that answers his question. I actually have the same problem. In order to run a script in the background I believe you'd have to use something like wget at shell, so wget http://url.com/file.php

But, even if I add a -T 999999999 flag, it still quits because its says no data has been received. I don't understand it, it seems the php file doesn't return anything until it's actually done with the script, which is quite impossible if it's an infinite loop. any insight?

mhalloran

The best way to do this type of thing is usually to use the crontab to run a script once every 10 minutes or so.

If you are using Linux, do a search for "crontab" and "lynx" in this form (and Google) and I'm sure you'll find plenty of discussions.

good luck.

mahers

Maybe Cron Jobs is what you're after?

Joe826

Yeah I think crontabs would definetly work for him. In my parituclar case, i'm developing a script to check a given list of URLs for linkbacks. When I give it a very big list of URLs, I get the wget errors I was talking about before, and if I open it in IE it times out after awhile. I'm totally stuck, any other ideas?

Joe

mcalpine

thanks for the ideas.....
but still no good.......
when i run an endless loop...... the server tells me that the script has been termintated because it took longer than 30 seconds to perform....... so endless loops are not going to work......
any other ideas...... im using windows PHP ....

thanks

mhalloran

Well, you can change the expire time of a script by using set_time_limit (1000)
The number in the parentheses is the amount of seconds the script will run before it times out. If you use zero ( set_time_limit(0) ), the script will run forever.

Having a script run forever is a really bad idea though and having the crontab run a script that takes a split second to execute every 15 minutes or so is much better way to go.

Assuming your calender events are stored in a MySQL database, you can run a script every 15 minutes that select all events that occurred in the last 15 minutes and then sent a mail if there was a result.

EDIT: Does anyone know what Windows uses for event scheduling?

mcalpine

what is a crontab ?
how do i use it?

thanks

EviL_CodE

EDIT: Does anyone know what Windows uses for event scheduling?

Windows uses the Task Manager for event scheduling.

mcalpine, try this link;

http://www.tldp.org/LDP/lame/LAME/linux-admin-made-easy/using-cron.html

diego25

Task Manager is to manage processess...To schedule events, use the Task Scheduler on Windows (Start -> Programs -> Accessories -> System Tools -> Scheduled Tasks).

Diego

abx_2112

And the good thing about cron jobs is that you can code them in php, so if you are able to do it on your server that's the best solution.