I’ve been banging my head against the wall all day trying to get a timed rule to work. I’m guessing I’ve got something wrong in my syntax. Here’s the rule:
import org.openhab.core.library.types.*
import org.openhab.core.persistence.*
import org.openhab.model.script.actions.*
import java.lang.Math
import java.util.Calendar
import java.util.Date
import java.util.TimeZone
import java.text.SimpleDateFormat
rule "Test"
when
Time cron "0 17 17 1/1 * ? *"
then
sendCommand(Test_Number, 255)
end
and here’s the device:
Number Test_Number "Test Number [%s]" <wind> (Living,HVAC)
I used Cronmaker website to generate the cron information. I am assuming that this reads like this:
At 17:17, change Test_Number to 255
This does not work nor do any of my other cron timed events. I included my includes but I’m not sure I have or need something to make cron work.
Can someone please clue me in to what I am doing wrong. I am running OH on Win 7 if that maters. Thanks!
without much of any other idea, I would say Windows does not have cron running like any Linux system would. At least this is what I would figure out first.
Neither am I – new to openHAB as well --, but what else would ‘consume’ the cron parameter string?
Let us know how you went, and if it solved the problem, feel free to tick the ‘tick’-box.
@sihui, thanks… I did try that import last night and it didn’t make a difference.
@larshendrikkorte, I tried adding ‘logInfo(“Mydebug”, “Write to log if cron job runs”)’ to my when condition and it did not write out the log. It’s like cron is not working.
Can anyone suggest another way to test this? I think my example is very basic but it will not run.
Are there any other options besides cron? I know that there are statements like ‘is midnight’ or ‘is noon’, but are there others? Can I use ‘is 17:17’?
@sihui Thank you for posting this. I made a separate rules file (I currently have them all in one big rules file) using your settings and it worked. I don’t know what the problem is with the one I’m using but I’m guessing it’s the java.util.Date or something. Thanks again.
Just to complete the explanation, Quartz does not strictly follow the standard cron format so websites like cronmaker may not generate correctly formatted cron strings.
In Quarts the fields are (from the Rules wiki page):
Seconds
Minutes
Hours
Day-of-Month
Month
Day-of-Week
Year (optional field)
Typically to have it run every day you would use “*” instead of “1/1”. I’m not sure what 1/1 would do in the Day of the Month field and that might be causing some headache.
There are no includes required to use a Time cron trigger in a rules file. So the include org.joda.time.* is a red herring.
Sorry, colloquialisms sometimes pop up in my postings.
It is indeed an English colloquialism which means “a misleading clue”.
You actually made me go down the rabbit hole (oops, another colloquialism) to look up the origin. It comes from Middle English and refers to the practice of fugitives using pieces of smoked herring (which are red in color as opposed to fresh herring which is white) to throw blood hounds off their scent.
In this case, something being wrong with the imports is a red herring because it distracts us from the real cause of the problem.
Thanks for pointing out Cronmaker. I am not a dumb man but the crons kept baffling me and when I ran some through Cronmaker, they turned out to be different from what I expected. I won’t tire my brain over it anymore but use cronmaker. Thanks
