Running a PHP Mailer Script via Cron

Question

I have a php mailer script that needs to run every hour via cron job. Basically it collects information from a database attaches this in the phpmailer via html and sends it out.

Via the web service if i browse to the mailer it runs perfectly and i receive the mail. However when doing this via cron the mail does not send out.

I have currently set the cron to run every 5 minutes just to test and touch a tmp file just to know it has run:

*/5 * * * * /var/www/Mailer/311-daily-production-3shifts-mailer.php; touch /tmp/mailerhasrun

anyone know what the issue can be? i am logged in via the root user on my pi.

EDIT

If i now run the script directly from the command line i get the following error, however it is still working from the web service

root@raspberrypi:~# php /var/www/Mailer/311-daily-production-3shifts-mailer.php
PHP Warning:  include(./scripts/311-daily-production-3shifts.php): failed to open stream: No such file or directory in /var/www/Mailer/311-daily-production-3shifts-mailer.php on line 10
PHP Warning:  include(): Failed opening './scripts/311-daily-production-3shifts.php' for inclusion (include_path='.:/usr/share/php:/usr/share/pear') in /var/www/Mailer/311-daily-production-3shifts-mailer.php on line 10
PHP Warning:  require(./library/PHPMailerAutoload.php): failed to open stream: No such file or directory in /var/www/Mailer/311-daily-production-3shifts-mailer.php on line 14
PHP Fatal error:  require(): Failed opening required './library/PHPMailerAutoload.php' (include_path='.:/usr/share/php:/usr/share/pear') in /var/www/Mailer/311-daily-production-3shifts-mailer.php on line 14

EDIT:

I have fixed my php errors and when i run /usr/bin/php /var/www/Mailer/311-daily-production-3shifts-mailer.php from command line it sends the mail as required. However the cron is still not working.

Answer 1

Use correct shebang[1] line in your script. Your php-cli executable path may differ, please find your your executable before editing.

#!/usr/bin/php
<?php
  // your script here;
?>

to use crontab in correct way, you should give full path to run interpreter or set PATH variable before cron lines. Also, you should use && instead ; .

( ; : run second command regardless of first command output. && : run second command if first command ran successfully. )

In your case it should like below.

*/5 * * * * /usr/bin/php /var/www/Mailer/311-daily-production-3shifts-mailer.php && touch /tmp/mailerhasrun

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shebang_(Unix)