Why my cron job is running every minute when it is scheduled to run every hour?

Question

I have a script that creates a cron job to take a backup of a local MongoDB. When I execute crontab -l command, I see following:

* */1 * * * cd /home/user/shell-scripts && sh mongo-backup.sh

I previously configured the same cronjob to run every minute but then I edited it. I have restarted my machine after editing the job.

What am I doing wrong?

Thanks

pl_rock · Accepted Answer · 2015-09-15 05:30:01Z

5

use 0 at place of first * like :

0 */1 * * * cd /home/user/shell-scripts && sh mongo-backup.sh

if you use * it means it will execute every minute.

answered Sep 15 '15 at 5:30

pl_rock

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I am trying your solution. – Darshan Puranik Sep 15 '15 at 5:42
Thanks for your speedy answer. Now the job is not running every minute. That's a partial success. – Darshan Puranik Sep 15 '15 at 5:55
FYI, Backup scripts executes every hour on dot like 6 then 7 and so on with the solution you suggested. It doesnt execute hour after you create cron job. For example if you create cronjob at 5:27 then first execution will be at 6:00, second execution will be at 7:00 and so on. – Darshan Puranik Sep 15 '15 at 7:08
yes , if you want to run every hour on 27 minute then you have to do like : 27 */1 * * * cd /home/user/shell-scripts && sh mongo-backup.sh – pl_rock Sep 15 '15 at 7:37
@DarshanPuranik - take a look at some crontab examples and tutorial to better understand it, for example thegeekstuff.com/2009/06/15-practical-crontab-examples (but Google knows much more and there is always man crontab, although it's rather elaborate and long); also, you can just have /home/user/shell-scripts/mongo-backup.sh instead of cd /home/user/shell-scripts && sh mongo-backup.sh – Marek Bettman Sep 15 '15 at 7:54

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