Scheduling cron jobs in docker : A How-To Guide

The cron command-line utility is a job scheduler on Unix-like operating systems. Users who set up and maintain software environments use cron to schedule jobs, also known as cron jobs, to run periodically at fixed times, dates, or intervals.

Docker is a set of platform as a service products that use OS-level virtualization to deliver software in packages called containers.

This blog describes how to implement crontab functionality in docker.

I will create 3 Linux shell scripts:

• the first one will be scheduled to run every 1 minute
• the second one will be scheduled to run every 2 minutes
• the third one will be scheduled to run every 3 minutes

Each script will generate some message. The output from the scripts is redirected to a log file. The log file will be printed when a docker container runs.

Step 1: Create a new directory

mkdir cron-docker

Step 2: Create the 3 Linux shell scripts

script_to_run_every_1min.sh:

dmi@dmi-VirtualBox:~/cron_docker$ cat script_to_run_every_1min.sh
#!/bin/bash

echo "$0: $(date)"


script_to_run_every_2min.sh:

dmi@dmi-VirtualBox:~/cron_docker$ cat script_to_run_every_2min.sh
#!/bin/bash

echo "$0: $(date)"


script_to_run_every_3min.sh:

dmi@dmi-VirtualBox:~/cron_docker$ cat script_to_run_every_3min.sh
#!/bin/bash

echo "$0: $(date)"

Step 3: Create cron_task file

dmi@dmi-VirtualBox:~/cron_docker$ cat cron_task
* * * * * root /my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh >> /my_cron_in_docker/cron_task.log 2>&1
*/2 * * * * root /my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_2min.sh >> /my_cron_in_docker/cron_task.log 2>&1
*/3 * * * * root /my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_3min.sh >> /my_cron_in_docker/cron_task.log 2>&1

# empty line

Step 4: Create Dockerfile

dmi@dmi-VirtualBox:~/cron_docker$ cat Dockerfile
FROM ubuntu:22.04

MAINTAINER Dmitry R

RUN apt update && apt install cron -y

RUN mkdir -p my_cron_in_docker

ADD script_to_run_every_1min.sh my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh
ADD script_to_run_every_2min.sh my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_2min.sh
ADD script_to_run_every_3min.sh my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_3min.sh

RUN chmod 0755 my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh
RUN chmod 0755 my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_2min.sh
RUN chmod 0755 my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_3min.sh

ADD cron_task /etc/cron.d/cron_task

RUN chmod 0644 /etc/cron.d/cron_task

RUN touch my_cron_in_docker/cron_task.log

CMD cron && tail -f my_cron_in_docker/cron_task.log

dmi@dmi-VirtualBox:~/cron_docker$

Step 5: Create Docker image from the Dockerfile

docker build -t mycron .

Step 6: Start container

docker run mycron

Step 7: Check that the implemented functionality works correctly

dmi@dmi-VirtualBox:~/cron_docker$ docker run mycron
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:20:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_2min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:20:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_3min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:21:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:21:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_2min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:22:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:22:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:23:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:24:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_3min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:24:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_2min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:24:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:25:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_2min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:26:02 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:26:02 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:27:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_3min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:27:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_2min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:28:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:28:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:29:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_3min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:30:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:30:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_2min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:30:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:31:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_2min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:32:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:32:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_3min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:33:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:33:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:34:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_2min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:34:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:35:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_3min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:36:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:36:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_2min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:36:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:37:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:38:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_2min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:38:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:39:02 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_3min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:39:02 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_2min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:40:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:40:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:41:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_3min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:42:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:42:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_2min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:42:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:43:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_2min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:44:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:44:01 UTC 2022
/my_cron_in_docker/script_to_run_every_1min.sh: Fri Dec  2 14:45:01 UTC 2022

Conclusion

In this blog post I’ve demonstrated how to implement cron jobs in docker. This approach can be used to create scheduler(s) in docker containers.