[rancid] F5 backups are only working for some hosts via cron, but always manually

[Alan McKinnon]

On 04/12/2013 18:22, Stephan Seitz wrote:
> Hi!
> 
> I have two F5 clusters, bigip2a/bigip2b and bigip3a/bigip3b.
> If I start rancid-run for these four hosts manually all four hosts are
> backuped without problems. But if rancid-run is launched via cron I get
> error messages for the two b systems (bigip2b and bigip3b).
> 
> The rancid log shows messages like:
> bigip3b: found unexpected command - "bigpipe list"
> bigip2b: missed cmd(s): ls --full-time --color=never
> /config/ssl/ssl.crt,ls --full-time --color=never /config/ssl/ssl.key
> bigip3b: missed cmd(s): ls --full-time --color=never
> /config/ssl/ssl.crt,ls --full-time --color=never /config/ssl/ssl.key
> bigip3b: End of run not found
> 
> Why don’t I have the same errors if I run „rancid-run bigip3b”? And how
> can I fix it?
> 
> Shade and sweet water!
> 
>     Stephan


This is a common problem with cron and has little to do with the program
being run and everything to do with the environment. Cron does not run
out of a login shell, so the environment is not set up at all. As a
human user you get used to this being there and forget it is entirely
absent from cron.

Look in the .raw files generated by f5rancid and see what's going around
the end of 'bigpipe route static show' and beginning of 'ls --full-time
--color=never /config/ssl/ssl.crt'

With luck you'll find clues as to an environment-related cause.

Unfortunately there's no easy answer to your question as there are 100s
of possible causes. You need to look closely at your own unique results.

-- 
Alan McKinnon
alan.mckinnon at gmail.com