New virtual package: cron-daemon

Create a virtual cron daemon package that:
 - Has to provide /usr/bin/crontab and support crontab entries
 - Correct execution of /etc/cron.d
 - Correct support of /etc/crontab
 - Support of crontab entries with names for days and months,
   ranges, step values
 - Correct execution of /etc/cron.{hourly,daily,weekly,monthly}

Signed-off-by: Javier Fernández-Sanguino Peña <jfs@computer.org>
Signed-off-by: Manoj Srivastava <srivasta@debian.org>

diff --git a/policy.sgml b/policy.sgml
index 042e82f05f0d0fb700211dc2fef44cc8966d98bf..76ac0d44351c2b98a95fa86c7cbeba464a54b0c0 100644 (file)
--- a/policy.sgml
+++ b/policy.sgml
@@ -6552,13 +6552,48 @@ Reloading <var>description</var> configuration...done.
          <prgn>anacron</prgn>. Thus, you should only use this
          directory for jobs which may be skipped if the system is not
          running.)</p>
+       <p>
+          Unlike <file>crontab</file> files described in the IEEE Std
+          1003.1-2008 (POSIX.1) available from
+          <url id="http://www.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/9699919799/"
+               name="The Open Group">, the files in
+          <file>/etc/cron.d</file> and the file
+          <file>/etc/crontab</file> have seven fields; namely:
+          <enumlist>
+            <item>Minute [0,59]</item>
+            <item>Hour [0,23]</item>
+            <item>Day of the month [1,31]</item>
+            <item>Month of the year [1,12]</item>
+            <item>Day of the week ([0,6] with 0=Sunday)</item>
+            <item>Username</item>
+            <item>Command to be run</item>
+          </enumlist>
+          Ranges of numbers are allowed.  Ranges are two numbers
+          separated with a hyphen.  The specified range is inclusive.
+          Lists are allowed.  A list is a set of numbers (or ranges)
+          separated by commas. Step values can be used in conjunction
+          with ranges.
+        </p>
 
        <p>
-         The scripts or crontab entries in these directories should
+         The scripts or <tt>crontab</tt> entries in these directories should
          check if all necessary programs are installed before they
          try to execute them. Otherwise, problems will arise when a
          package was removed but not purged since configuration files
-         are kept on the system in this situation.</p>
+         are kept on the system in this situation.
+        </p>
+
+        <p>
+          Any <tt>cron</tt> daemon must provide
+          <file>/usr/bin/crontab</file> and support normal
+          <tt>crontab</tt> entries as specified in POSIX. The daemon
+          must also support names for days and months, ranges, and
+          step values. It has to support <file>/etc/crontab</file>,
+          and correctly execute the scripts in
+          <file>/etc/cron.d</file>. The daemon must also correctly
+          execute scripts in
+          <file>/etc/cron.{hourly,daily,weekly,monthly}</file>.
+        </p>
       </sect>
 
       <sect id="menus">

diff --git a/virtual-package-names-list.txt b/virtual-package-names-list.txt
index d1beab876a17b73cc84b8482c658b07bfdfc6b04..9ba66e57b079f8e18f640d5450662eeebaf4fff0 100644 (file)
--- a/virtual-package-names-list.txt
+++ b/virtual-package-names-list.txt
@@ -83,6 +83,7 @@ System
                          other applications
  time-daemon             anything that serves as a time daemon
  ups-monitor             anything that is capable of controlling an UPS
+ cron-daemon             Any cron daemon that correctly follows policy requirements
 
 Documentation
 -------------
@@ -315,3 +316,6 @@ Russ Allbery:
               Rename inetd-superserver to inet-superserver
    2 Dec 2007 Added ttf-japanese-gothic
               Added ttf-japanese-mincho
+
+Manoj Srivastava:
+  21 Nov 2009 (Re)Added cron-daemon