Can't get cron to launch realplayer

[Infohawk]

I'm using a gentoo box with vixie-cron.

I followed the guides to allow my user to access crontab.

I tested out some basic commands like echoing "test" to a file. That works fine. What doesn't work is starting /usr/bin/realplayer or /usr/bin/gedit. I tried making a script that would itself run realplayer and starting the script from cron but that doesn't seem to work. I didn't see anything in the logs.

What is happening here? How do I get cron to launch an X program.

 

[n0cmonkey]

What's the entry? Did you try outputting the results from your script to a file? Did you set $DISPLAY?

 

[Infohawk]

15 21 * * 1-5 /usr/bin/realplay

15 21 * * 1-5 /usr/bin/realplay >> /home/user/test
doesn't do anything

echo $DISPLAY:
:0.0

 

[kamper]

Originally posted by: Infohawk
15 21 * * 1-5 /usr/bin/realplay

15 21 * * 1-5 /usr/bin/realplay >> /home/user/test
doesn't do anything

echo $DISPLAY:
:0.0

$DISPLAY from your shell shouldn't matter, it's the $DISPLAY that's set where cron runs realplay that counts. I imagine you want to write a script that sets $DISPLAY and then starts reaplay and then call the script from cron, but I don't know if you can one-line it and keep in all in the crontab.

 

[Infohawk]

Just noticed a file called dead.letter in ~/

* ERROR **: Unable to open display
aborting...
/usr/bin/realplay: line 75: 15391 Aborted $REALPLAYBIN "$@"



(gedit:15561): Gtk-WARNING **: cannot open display:



** ERROR **: Unable to open display
aborting...
/usr/bin/realplay: line 75: 16053 Aborted $REALPLAYBIN "$@"

So I need to make a bash script that sets the display variable? WHich variable do I want the script to set?

 

[kamper]

You want to set $DISPLAY, presumably to ":0.0" if you want it on the same display that you're using currently.

 

[Infohawk]

Still not working:

#!/bin/bash
set DISPLAY=localhost:0.0
/usr/bin/realplay

01 * * * * /home/user/.radioalarm

 

[n0cmonkey]

Try:

01 * * * * /home/user/.radioalarm > /home/user/reallog 2>&1

 

[Infohawk]

That gives me:

** ERROR **: Unable to open display
aborting...
/usr/bin/realplay: line 75: 10798 Aborted $REALPLAYBIN "$@"

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: Infohawk
That gives me:

** ERROR **: Unable to open display
aborting...
/usr/bin/realplay: line 75: 10798 Aborted $REALPLAYBIN "$@"

There you go, there's the problem. I can't see anything wrong with your script though, so I'm not sure how to fix it off hand. I'll try to play around.

 

[Nothinman]

I believe you need to export the variable otherwise it won't be passed down to children processes.

 

[Infohawk]

I tried to export this but now nothing seems to happen, not even the error.

#!/bin/bash
export DISPLAY=localhost:0.0
/usr/bin/realplay

When I export, I don't need the "$" before the variable right?

Perhaps I'm going about this the wrong way. Is there a gnome utility that launches apps at a certain time?

 

[kamper]

I can never figure out the correct syntax for setting env variables in different shells withouth a lot of fooling around. In your bash script, try "echo $DISPLAY" right after setting it to make sure you've got it right. (Be sure to pipe the output of the script still, or you won't see what it prints).

 

[Infohawk]

Originally posted by: kamper
I can never figure out the correct syntax for setting env variables in different shells withouth a lot of fooling around. In your bash script, try "echo $DISPLAY" right after setting it to make sure you've got it right. (Be sure to pipe the output of the script still, or you won't see what it prints).

localhost:0.0

 

[Infohawk]

Is there a gnome way of launching apps at certain times?

 

[nweaver]

If all you are doing is playing an audio file, I would just use the mplayer command line to get this done. I'm not a big rp fan in the windows or linux world.