Schedule a task with at¶

There are multiple ways to schedule a task on your server. This guide will explain how to create a one time task to run using the at command. An example of a use of this would be when you would like to schedule a reboot to take place at a certain time. To schedule a job you will need to type the at command. You can follow this with the desired time you want the task to execute at. You will then be prompted for the task that you wish to run at this time. Once you have finished, you will need to press ctrl + d together. An example is shown below which schedules a reboot to take place at 1pm.

at 13:00
warning: commands will be executed using /bin/sh
at> reboot
at> <EOT>

You can then view the list of at jobs by using the atq command. An example output of this is shown below.

atq
2       Fri Aug 12 13:00:00 2016 a root
1       Thu Aug 11 21:30:00 2016 a root

To cancel a scheduled at job you can use the atrm command followed by the ID of the scheduled job that you wish to cancel. The ID can be taken from the output of atq. An example to delete a scheduled task with the ID 2 is below.

atrm 2