Crontab Problem

Those settings are always there but your personal cron entries, in this case root's cron entries should be present in

/var/spool/cron
folder


Take a look, I didn't have any cron entry and the I created an entry.
[root@labvm3 ~]# crontab -l
no crontab for root
[root@labvm3 ~]# ls /var/spool/cron/
[root@labvm3 ~]# crontab -e
no crontab for root - using an empty one
crontab: installing new crontab
[root@labvm3 ~]# crontab -l
* * * * 1 echo "***"
[root@labvm3 ~]# ls /var/spool/cron/
root

So the file is
/var/spool/cron/root

You are looking at the system file.

try to see whether the cron folder is in your path enviroment variable
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environment_variable

Below is what happens when i try to run crontab -l

[root@server3 ~]# crontab -l
-bash: crontab: command not found

/etc/crontab

is the system crontab, not root's crontab!

Issue command
/bin/crontab

Your root user probably doesn't have /bin in its path OR you did

su

instead of doing

su -

crontab folder should be in path variable or you have to write the full path to the crontab -l
http://www.math.iitb.ac.in/resources/manuals/Unix_Unleashed/Vol_1/toc.htm

Results

[root@server3 ~]# /bin/crontab
-bash: /bin/crontab: No such file or directory

No i am getting permission denied.

I am logged in as root.

[root@server3 ~]# /etc/crontab
-bash: /etc/crontab: Permission denied

NO

I SAID BIN NOT ETC

/bin/crontab

If this still doesn't resolve the problem:

Please issue command
rpm -q cronie

If you don't have this RPM install it by issuing command

yum -y install cronie

[root@server3 ~]# rpm -q cronie
package cronie is not installed
[root@server3 ~]# yum -y install cronie
Loaded plugins: fastestmirror
Loading mirror speeds from cached hostfile
 * base: centos.corenetworks.net
 * extras: mirror.sanctuaryhost.com
 * updates: mirror.serversurgeon.com
Setting up Install Process
No package cronie available.
Nothing to do

The User's Shell Startup File: .profile Under each Bourne shell user's home directory is a file named .profile. This is where a system administrator or user (if given write permission) can make permanent modifications to his shell environment. To add a directory to the existing execution path, just add the following as line into .profile.

PATH=$PATH:/sql/bin ; export PATH

Sorry, on Centos it is

/usr/bin/crontab

I was on Fedora.

[root@server3 ~]# /usr/bin/crontab
-bash: /usr/bin/crontab: No such file or directory

However, cronie is the correct package for CentOS

Ok, looks like you really don't have this package installed and you don't seem to have it from yum either.  Do you have CD/DVD?

ok..i got crontab installed using the code below

    yum install vixie-cron crontabs
    /sbin/chkconfig crond on
    /sbin/service crond start

Now i am receiving an error that states

[root@server3 ~]# crontab -l
no crontab for root

Also issue command

chkconfig crond on

So that it stays on after reboot.

http://www.math.iitb.ac.in/resources/manuals/Unix_Unleashed/Vol_1/ch21.htm

Login as the adm user and use crontab -e to edit the crontab file to activate the daily accounting functions. By editing the /var/spool/cron/crontabs/adm file, you are allowing cron to control the periodic collection and reporting of statistical data. See the example of the crontab entries for runacct, dodisk, ckpacct, and monacct below:

10 23 * * 0-6 /usr/lib/acct/runacct 2>/usr/adm/acct/nite/accterr > /dev/null
0  23 * * 0-6 /usr/lib/acct/dodisk > /dev/null 2>&1
0  *  * * *   /usr/lib/acct/ckpacct > /dev/null 2>&1
15 4  1 * *   /usr/lib/acct/monacct > /dev/null 2>&1