Scheduling one-time jobs for Linux

Using the at Command for Scheduled Maintenance

We may need some maintenance works for our database systems. If we don’t want to spend our evening with all the rebooting processes, the at command is here to help us.

echo "<command>" | at 22:00 Jan 18 2024

This command above runs a specific job at the desired date and time. Here’s a more specific example for maintenance on a PostgreSQL database:

echo "yum update -y\nsystemctl stop postgresql-15.service\nreboot" | at 23:00 Jan 20 2024

We can list all jobs with the atq command. Moreover, using at -c <id>, we can check the details of scheduled commands. If a schedule was entered mistakenly, the at -r <id> command would help us remove it.

atq
        at -c <id>
        at -r <id>

This simple yet powerful tool can save you from staying up late for routine tasks. Use it wisely!