Solaris is the example I've run into. It is the same for AIX and HP-UX.

To be portable there's really only the The Open Group's minimum specification for what a crontab looks like that counts. It's the only cross platform standard that I know about that they all comply with.

http://pubs.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/9699919799/utilities/crontab.html

(admittedly it is pretty simple)


Btw: This is the ONLY problem I've come across when installing OTRS on Solaris and it is of course easy to work around, so I do not think it is big thing if you correct this or not. A part from the cron script problem installing OTRS on Solaris was a breeze.(this was Solaris 11)

You can always do something like this in the beginning of the bash script:


OS=$(uname)

case "$OS" in
    SunOS)
       echo "Solaris detected. This script only works with Vixie cron or derivatives."
       echo "Install OTRS cron jobs manually."
       exit 1
       ;;
    AIX)
       echo "AIX detected. This script only works with Vixie cron or derivatives."
       echo "Install OTRS cron jobs manually."
       exit 1
       ;;
    HP-UX)
       echo "HP-UX detected. This script only works with Vixie cron or derivatives."
       echo "Install OTRS cron jobs manually."
       exit 1
       ;;
    *)
      ;;
esac

This won't solve the problem but will not lead astray novice Solaris, AIX or HP-UX users.

Brian

From: Michiel Beijen <michiel.beijen@gmail.com>
To: "brianmortonb2b-atwork@yahoo.dk" <brianmortonb2b-atwork@yahoo.dk>; User questions and discussions about OTRS. <otrs@otrs.org>
Sent: Friday, August 24, 2012 12:45 PM
Subject: Re: [otrs] cron jobs syntax

Hi Brian,

Thanks for the suggestion, but can you please be a little more
specific as to which platforms and versions you know that do not
understand the Vixie syntax OTRS uses?

AFAIK all Linuxen and *BSDs have vixie cron or anacron and this is no
problem there. Also, I still have to run into the first company to
want to run OTRS on AIX or HP-UX.
--
Mike

On Fri, Aug 24, 2012 at 11:33 AM, brianmortonb2b-atwork@yahoo.dk
<brianmortonb2b-atwork@yahoo.dk> wrote:
>
> The cron jobs that script bin/Cron.sh tries to insert implicitly depends on
> the platform having Paul Vixie's cron because it use the slash syntax for
> repeating ranges. Many Unix/Linux platforms use this cron, but not all.
>
> I suggest to make this a little more portable. Example: Instead of writing:
>
> */20 * * * *    $HOME/bin/otrs.GenericAgent.pl >> /dev/null
>
> then bite the bullet and do:
>
> 0,20,40 * * * *    $HOME/bin/otrs.GenericAgent.pl >> /dev/null
>
>
> Yes, I know it looks ugly but it will make OTRS more portable.
>
>
> Lastly not all cron's support the 'crontab filename username' syntax.
> However they all support the 'crontab filename' syntax meaning that in order
> to be truly portable you have to change the script so that it MUST be
> executed as the OTRS user himself, not as root. A small price to pay for
> portability.
>
>
> Brian
>
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