Crontab and database updates

[Pie]

I have a database which is updated every few minutes using crontab. This works fine for the first few days but after that it seems that the database is unable to accept anymore update commands. Is this a problem with crontab itself, the commands buffer becoming overloaded or something else altogether?

[bastien]

could be a lot of things depending on db...

1. db has outgrown disk space (max file size allowed)
2. db has outgrown tablespace (depends on db)
3. db has outgrown memory allowed for table
4. the length of time taken by the cron job is causing a backup in the log files and the db hangs

check the db manual, see if there is an alert.log type file that holds information about the dbs activity (in oracle its the alert.log, in mysql its the error log

check with your dba if you have one

[Pie]

Right, I'll go check out your suggestions first, thanks.