pm2 doesnt work with crontab

plainbroke

@sdetweil
Using NVMe disk 256gb smallest I had on hand. 3 of them are exhibiting the same issues. I did try going back to Bookworm and I am still getthing a blank screen after a while. I ran npm run config:check it says all is good in the config.js ////
I am currently reloading from scratch.
Which OS is better for the 2.33 MM? 32 or 64 bit?
Wondering if I was using 32 bit and now the 64 bit is messing with me… So dang many things can mess with these little devices.

I only use crontab -e, should I try sudo crontab -e

sdetweil

@plainbroke no, without sudo is best

Maybe pm2 isn’t in the path when crontab fires
Check the syslog for crontab errors

32 bit is about to be trouble.

The latest nodejs version, 24, has dropped builds for 32 bit

plainbroke

@sdetweil
Thanks for the info I almost pulled down 32 bit.
It has been interesting to say the least going to trixie.
Turns out my problem was a failed NVMe drive.
I thought those things where supposed to last for a LONG long time…
I did get crontab -e to work with trixie and MM 2.33 not a fun ride, but entertaining. I finally learned how to use bash to make batch style files…
So not a complete loss of time…

sdetweil

@plainbroke technology is SOOOO much fun! Simple, til it’s not!

Thanks for the feedback. Others will ask, I’m sure they could use your help!

plainbroke

@sdetweil
Ok crontab -e worked last night to shutdown MM. So the pm2 stop all worked.
BUT this morning the pm2 restart mm did nothing.
I used find to get these:

/home/pi/MagicMirror/node_modules/.bin/pm2
/home/pi/MagicMirror/node_modules/pm2
/home/pi/MagicMirror/node_modules/pm2/bin/pm2
/home/pi/MagicMirror/node_modules/pm2/lib/templates/logrotate.d/pm2
/home/pi/MagicMirror/node_modules/pm2/pm2
/usr/local/bin/pm2
/usr/local/lib/node_modules/pm2
/usr/local/lib/node_modules/pm2/bin/pm2
/usr/local/lib/node_modules/pm2/lib/templates/logrotate.d/pm2
/usr/local/lib/node_modules/pm2/pm2

ANY idea on which one would work better.?
Here is my current crontab -e

# Turn off display at 9pm
00 21 * * 0-6 /usr/local/bin/pm2 stop all >/dev/null >2&1
# Turn on screen Monday - Friday at 6:45 am
45 06 * * 1-5 /usr/local/bin/pm2 start mm >/dev/null >2&1
# Turn on screen Saturday - Sunday at 7:30 am
30 07 * * 6,0 /usr/local/bin/pm2 start mm >/dev/null >2&1

sdetweil

@plainbroke which one, if any , are in the path
Are they all executable?

ls -laF
Will give you the permissions mask

Are any of them links to another?

What changed?

/usr/local/bin/pm2
Should be the one

sdetweil

@plainbroke also look in /var/log/syslog
To find the logging of the execute at the time it should fire

plainbroke

@sdetweil
Weird, I do not have /var/log/syslog.
Even did a find for it nothing, popped up…

pi@Pixie:~ $ ls -laF
total 348
drwx------ 15 pi   pi     4096 Nov 10 15:36 ./
drwxr-xr-x  3 root root   4096 Sep 30 19:18 ../
-rw-------  1 pi   pi     9080 Nov 10 13:17 .bash_history
-rw-r--r--  1 pi   pi      220 Sep 30 19:06 .bash_logout
-rw-r--r--  1 pi   pi     3523 Sep 30 19:06 .bashrc
drwx------ 13 pi   pi     4096 Nov  7 18:22 .cache/
drwx------ 22 pi   pi     4096 Nov  8 12:57 .config/
drwx------  3 pi   pi     4096 Nov  7 17:49 .dbus/
drwxrwxr-x  2 pi   pi     4096 Sep 30 19:17 Desktop/
drwx------  2 pi   pi     4096 Nov  7 23:11 Documents/
-rw-rw-r--  1 pi   pi        0 Nov  7 20:00 .gitconfig
-rw-rw-r--  1 pi   pi       81 Nov  7 18:24 .gtkrc-2.0
-rw-rw-r--  1 pi   pi   222126 Oct 27 18:52 install.log
drwx------  4 pi   pi     4096 Sep 30 19:18 .local/
drwxrwxr-x 16 pi   pi     4096 Nov  8 12:54 MagicMirror/
-rwxrwxrwx  1 pi   pi      320 Jun 12  2022 mm.json*
-rwxrwxrwx  1 pi   pi       38 Jul 16  2023 mm.sh*
drwx------  4 pi   pi     4096 Nov  6 21:05 .mozilla/
drwxrwxr-x  4 pi   pi     4096 Oct 27 18:30 .npm/
drwx------  3 pi   pi     4096 Oct 27 18:52 .pki/
drwxrwxr-x  5 pi   pi     4096 Nov  9 17:24 .pm2/
-rw-r--r--  1 pi   pi      807 Sep 30 19:06 .profile
-rw-rw-r--  1 pi   pi       66 Oct 27 19:22 .selected_editor
drwxrwxr-x  4 pi   pi     4096 Nov 10 15:43 shared/
-rw-r--r--  1 pi   pi        0 Sep 30 19:18 .sudo_as_admin_successful
drwx------  3 pi   pi     4096 Nov  5 17:30 .vnc/
-rw-------  1 pi   pi       50 Nov  9 17:24 .Xauthority
-rw-------  1 pi   pi     8238 Nov  9 19:32 .xsession-errors
-rw-------  1 pi   pi     7945 Nov  9 17:24 .xsession-errors.old

mumblebaj

@plainbroke Instead of piping the output to a blackhole, maybe pipe it to a logfile which you can interrogate to see why the pm2 start is not working?

evroom

About /var/log/syslog.
Debian does not use that anymore, already since a while.
As far as I understand it, you will need to get familiar with journalctl.
For cron jobs try this:

$ journalctl --since "1 hour ago" --unit cron.service

$ journalctl -f -u cron.service

Happy hunting.