Cron jobs not running after upgrade to Amazon Linux 2

Question

I've got crons setup in /etc/cron.d/mycron according to the article at https://repost.aws/knowledge-center/cron-job-elastic-beanstalk
These have been running (and still run) on my original EC2 server (retired platform Puma with Ruby 2.6 running on 64bit Amazon Linux/2.12.0).
I've created a new identical environment based on Amazon Linux 2 (Ruby 2.7 running on 64bit Amazon Linux 2/3.6.8), however no jobs get run.
I have SSH'd on to the new server and can see the files for the cron and the scripts are created fine (e.g `/etc/cron.d/charging_all` and `/usr/local/bin/charging_all.sh`) and I can manually run the scripts fine (e.g. [`ec2-user@ip-10-0-1-8 current]$ sudo /usr/local/bin/charging_all.sh`) so it appears it's nothing to do with security groups or permissions.

So I'm wondering if there is some difference between the old Amazon Linux and the new/current Amazon Linux 2 handles cron jobs?  My setup is exactly as per https://repost.aws/knowledge-center/cron-job-elastic-beanstalk but I'm wondering if that is still correct for Amazon Linux 2.

Everything else about the server/website is running just fine.  I have checked and rechecked all environment variables are correct.

Any suggestions muchly appreciated.

Thanks
Peter

Steve_M · Accepted Answer

Does the new version of Amazon Linux have the cron scheduler installed and running?
```
[ec2-user@ip-172-31-38-254 ~]$ sudo systemctl status crond
● crond.service - Command Scheduler
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/crond.service; enabled; preset: en>
     Active: active (running) since Fri 2023-06-02 03:40:22 UTC; 2s ago
   Main PID: 25539 (crond)
```
Rather surprisingly (to me anyway) the cron scheduler is not installed by default in Amazon Linux 2023, although it is a default in Amazon Linux 2.
```
[ec2-user@ip-172-31-46-115 ~]$ cat /etc/system-release
Amazon Linux release 2 (Karoo)
[ec2-user@ip-172-31-46-115 ~]$ ps -ef | grep cron
root      2339     1  0 03:32 ?        00:00:00 /usr/sbin/crond -n
ec2-user  2590  2548  0 03:34 pts/0    00:00:00 grep --color=auto cron
[ec2-user@ip-172-31-46-115 ~]$ rpm -qf /usr/sbin/crond
cronie-1.4.11-23.amzn2.x86_64
[ec2-user@ip-172-31-46-115 ~]$

[ec2-user@ip-172-31-38-254 ~]$ cat /etc/system-release
Amazon Linux release 2023 (Amazon Linux)
[ec2-user@ip-172-31-38-254 ~]$ ps -ef | grep cron
ec2-user    1762    1672  0 03:34 pts/0    00:00:00 grep --color=auto cron
[ec2-user@ip-172-31-38-254 ~]$ rpm -qa | grep cron
crontabs-1.11-24.20190603git.amzn2023.0.2.noarch
[ec2-user@ip-172-31-38-254 ~]$
```
If this is the same as you are seeing then you will need install it from the Amazon Linux 2023 repo, and once it's installed you need to start it (it will be enabled for restarting after susequent reboots).
```
[ec2-user@ip-172-31-38-254 ~]$ sudo yum install cronie -y
Last metadata expiration check: 0:07:19 ago on Fri Jun  2 03:32:34 2023.
Dependencies resolved.
================================================================================
 Package            Arch       Version                    Repository       Size
================================================================================
Installing:
 cronie             x86_64     1.5.7-1.amzn2023.0.2       amazonlinux     115 k
Installing dependencies:
 cronie-anacron     x86_64     1.5.7-1.amzn2023.0.2       amazonlinux      32 k

Transaction Summary
================================================================================
Install  2 Packages
.
.
.
Installed:
  cronie-1.5.7-1.amzn2023.0.2.x86_64 cronie-anacron-1.5.7-1.amzn2023.0.2.x86_64

Complete!
[ec2-user@ip-172-31-38-254 ~]$ sudo systemctl start crond
[ec2-user@ip-172-31-38-254 ~]$ sudo systemctl status crond
● crond.service - Command Scheduler
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/crond.service; enabled; preset: en>
     Active: active (running) since Fri 2023-06-02 03:40:22 UTC; 2s ago
.
.
.
```

Cron jobs not running after upgrade to Amazon Linux 2

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