UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

Hi All,
I have created 2 shell scripts and set Cron jobs which runs it at various frequencies.The first one which runs every 2 minutes Monday to Friday and another cron job runs at 11PM on the last Sunday of every month. I have given the cron job entries below.

Was wondering whether instead hard coding the parameter values meant for the shell script in the crontab whether it was ok to set them as unix level environment variable or something and then use them instead in the cron job.

I think it will make the cron job make cleaner as well as more easily manageable.

My DBA says to use a “config” file to contain all the parameters that I need to pass on to the script

What are your thoughts on this?.If I have to go the config file way, what do i need to do as i have don't know much about creating/updating config files...

Code:

#======================================================================================
# CRON JOB FOR RUNNING THE SHELL SCRIPTS
#======================================================================================
# ------------- minute (0 - 59)
# | ----------- hour (0 - 23)
# | | --------- day of month (1 - 31)
# | | | ------- month (1 - 12)
# | | | | ----- day of week (0 - 6) (Sunday=0)
# | | | | |
 */2 * * * 1-5 sh SHELL1.ksh <PARAM1> <PARAM2> <PARAM3> <PARAM4> <PARAM5> <PARAM6> <PARAM7> <PARAM8> <PARAM9> <PARAM10> <PARAM11>
23 * * * 0 [`date "+%d"` -gt 24] && sh SHELL2.ksh <PARAM1> <PARAM2> <PARAM3> <PARAM4> <PARAM5> <PARAM6> <PARAM7> <PARAM8> <PARAM9> <PARAM10> <PARAM11>

Just greate a file:
param1=value1
param2=value2
.....
source that file within your script

Code:

#!/bin/anyshell
......
. path/file

#and you can access the variables within your scripts
echo $param1

Hi,
thanks for the reply.I see what you are saying.But my issue is slightly different.My shell script takes 11 params and the shell script is run as a cron job.So instead of hard coding the values of the 11 parameters in the crontab file is there a way out to refer then from a file or something?..similar to the one you told me...such as setting the parameter values in the a cfg file and referring them in the crontab?
Thanks

Ok.I have placed all the paremeters as variables in a filecalled as CONFIG.cfg and assigned them the relevant values.

Then I have added this portion to the top of my crontab
#! . /path/CONFIG.cfg

But my cron does'nt seem to run..I am very new to Unix so please bear my ignorance

dont add the line to your crontab. add it to your scripts

Hi,
thanks very much and it worked.
Now another question:

How do I migrate this crontab of mine across various environments?
My colleague says it has to be manually typed into various unix boxes.Can't we have a script/file that we can install or place in a certain path so that we can eliminate manual typing of crontab entries?

Thanks
V