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has12zen
has12zen

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Using Cron keep your eyes in check

basic syntax for cron

a typical cron job looks like this

# m h  dom mon dow   command
  * *   *   *   *   /usr/bin/sh ls
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  • stand for wildcard this is not a cron tutorial this is just how i use it.

eyes.sh script

the bash script looks like

#!/bin/sh
export DISPLAY=:0
notify-send "EYES CHECK" "Look away for 15 seconds"
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without line no 2 it wont work as it sets the display for notify-send. I am using notify-send as my notification daemon.

make sure that your display is :0
you can do this with

echo $DISPLAY
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setting up crontab

first you will need to make sure cron is running you can do this by:

systemctl status cronie
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p.s. this is specific to arch based system.

once cron is running you can create/edit cron job with crontab -e

then paste the code present below into the window.

*/15 * * * * /usr/bin/sh  /home/elnovo/.noti/eyes.sh
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it runs every 15 min and eyes.sh is the bash script we discussed above. save it.
you can find the cron jobs currently present by crontab -l

sources

notify-send doesn't work from crontab

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Top comments (1)

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bartjaskulski profile image
Bartek Jaskulski •

Actually, I've written similar code to get along with my eyes, but... it didn't work and I've forgot about it.

Thanks to you, my eyes will rest sometimes 🤣

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