Checking and Starting cron from a Script (2 Approaches)

Sometimes I want to make sure my cron daemon is running, especially after a reboot or on a system where it might silently stop. Here's how I scripted that check, with two different approaches.

Script 1: Check and Start cron (Clean and Verbose)

#!/bin/bash

# Check the status of cron using 'service'
if service cron status >/dev/null 2>&1; then
    echo "Cron is detected to be running ✓ "
else
    echo "Cron not running, starting..."
    if sudo service cron start >/dev/null 2>&1; then
        echo "Cron has been started ✓"
    else
        echo "Failed to start Cron"
        exit 1
    fi
fi
echo

What it does:

• Silently checks if cron is running using service cron status

• If running, it prints a confirmation

• If not, it attempts to start the service via sudo

• Includes fallback error handling and success/failure output

Why it's reliable:

• Clear structure

• Doesn't rely on parsing output strings

• Safer and more portable across distros using the classic service interface

• Won’t break if the exact wording of cron status changes

---

Script 2: Check cron Using Output Parsing (Quicker but Fragile)

#!/bin/bash
cronstatus=$(service cron status | cut -c 4-)
if [ "$cronstatus" == "cron is not running" ]; then
    echo password123 | sudo -S service cron start
fi

What it does:

• Captures the output of service cron status

• Trims the first 3 characters using cut -c 4-

• Compares the string to cron is not running

• If it matches, pipes a hardcoded password to sudo and starts cron

Key Differences

My Thoughts

While Script 2 might feel quicker to write, it's brittle and not secure:

• Parsing the exact output of service is risky. Messages can vary between distros or updates.

• Hardcoding your sudo password is dangerous and defeats the point of using sudo.

Stick with Script 1. It’s safer, clearer, and easier to maintain.

Bonus: Cron Check on Startup

If you want to make sure cron is running every time your system boots, you could run Script 1 from a @reboot crontab entry or a systemd service.

But for WSL on a home workstation, the above is sufficient.