RHBA-2007:0685 - Bug Fix Advisory

Topic

An updated vixie-cron package that fixes various bugs and adds an
enhancement is now available.

Description

The vixie-cron package contains the Vixie version of cron. Cron is a
standard UNIX daemon that runs specified programs at scheduled times. Vixie
cron adds better security and more powerful configuration options to the
standard version of cron.

This updated package includes fixes for the following bugs:

• it was possible to edit a crontab file so quickly, the crontab command

did not recognize the file had changed and did not update the file on disk
as a consequence. This update fixes this by setting the mtime of the
temporary file created when invoking the crontab command to zero
(1970/01/01) and then checking to see if its mtime has changed after the
edit.

• cron did not detect changes to symbolic links pointing to crontab files.

This update fixes this by resetting the mtime on /etc/cron.d/ and forcing a
reload of the cron database.

This update also includes the following enhancement:

• Jobs added to a crontab table now execute immediately. Previous versions

waited until after the next execution before reloading the crontab table.
With this update, the reload occurs immediately.

All users should upgrade to this updated package, which resolves these
issues and adds this enhancement.

Solution

Before applying this update, make sure that all previously-released
errata relevant to your system have been applied. Use Red Hat
Network to download and update your packages. To launch the Red Hat
Update Agent, use the following command:

up2date

For information on how to install packages manually, refer to the
following Web page for the System Administration or Customization
guide specific to your system:

http://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/enterprise/

Affected Products

• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 4 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 4 ia64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 4 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation 4 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation 4 ia64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation 4 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop 4 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop 4 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for IBM z Systems 4 s390x
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for IBM z Systems 4 s390
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Power, big endian 4 ppc

Fixes

• BZ - 178836 - Editing crontab ("crontab -e") too quickly causes missed updates.
• BZ - 192783 - Job delayed after using crontab -e
• BZ - 221856 - Cron does not detect changed symlink

CVEs

(none)

References

(none)