Trying to setup cron jobs without PHP CLI

Wednesday 03 August 2011 6:43:35 am

I'm hosting an ez site on a shared shared linux server. 

I need to activate the 'notifications' facility that will send an email to the site editors and administrators to notify them that new content has been added by other users.

I'm trying to add the runcronjobs.php to the list of cronjobs that will run but each time it tries to run the script I get the following error message:

  PHP is currently using the 'cgi' interface. Make sure it is using the 'cli' interface

I have searched for similar posts and come across a few entries from 5 years ago.

Can someone tell me what is the latest thinking on how I can overcome this problem please?  My ISP is not willing to configure PHP to run with the CLI.  Moving to another server is unfortunately not an option for 'political' reasons.

Thanks,

Andy

Wednesday 03 August 2011 7:48:58 am

Hi Ali,

Yes - I came across all those as well - but they are from many years ago - and there were differing views as to how to solve the problem.

I've followed the steps documented in http://www.sitepoint.com/php-command-line-1-3/

ie. I included the file cli_compatibility.php at the top of the runcronjobs.php file but I still got the same error message when trying to run the runcronjobs.php script. 

I was wondering what the current agreed solution to the problem is...

Surely there must be a lot of other developers that have found themselves experiencing this problem during the last year or so.

Andy

Saturday 06 August 2011 10:07:49 am

Hi Robin,

I'm using cPanel so yes I can schedule PHP scripts to run.

I tried your workaround but I got the following when I ran the runcronjobsfrequent.php script:

Your script returned the following:
PHP Notice:  Undefined variable: argv in /home/sites/usincare.org.uk/public_html/runcronjobsfrequent.php on line 142
X-Powered-By: PHP/5.2.17
Set-Cookie: eZSESSID=hrv9k8cc9o136nnscul29hqiq5; path=/
Expires: Thu, 19 Nov 1981 08:52:00 GMT
Cache-Control: no-store, no-cache, must-revalidate, post-check=0, pre-check=0
Pragma: no-cache
Content-type: text/htm
Running cronjob part 'frequent'<br/>Running cronjobs/notification.php at: 06/08/2011 6:03 pm<br/>Starting notification event processing<br/>Done<br/>Completing cronjobs/notification.php at: 06/08/2011 6:03 pm<br/>Elapsed time: 00:00:00<br/><br/>Running cronjobs/workflow.php at: 06/08/2011 6:03 pm<br/>Checking for workflow processes<br/>Status list<br/>Workflow event deferred to cron job(4): 6<br/><br/>0 out of 6 processes was finished<br/>Completing cronjobs/workflow.php at: 06/08/2011 6:03 pm<br/>Elapsed time: 00:00:00<br/>

Is there anything else I can try please?

Thanks,

Andy

Saturday 06 August 2011 11:49:54 am

Hi Robin,

Line 142 reads:

   for ( $i = 1; $i < count( $argv ); ++$i )

Andy

Monday 08 August 2011 9:30:17 am

Hi Robin,

Has anyone been able to shed anymore light on this please?

Am I right in thinking that the following info in the cronjob notice indicates that the notification emails aren't being sent?  If so - I wonder if this will help to identify why the emails aren't being sent.

Checking for workflow processes<br/>Status list<br/>Workflow event deferred to cron job(4): 6<br/><br/>0 out of 6 processes was finished<br/>

If I goto the 'Workflow Processes' page within the Setup section of the web site's Admin area I can see the items listed.

I'd really appreciate any help you or your colleagues can give me.

Thanks,

Andy