Section 8 · System administration

atd.8

Package: at

ATD

atd − run jobs queued for later execution

atd [−l load_avg] [−b batch_interval] [−d] [−f] [−n] [−s]

atd runs jobs queued by at(1).


	−l		Specifies a limiting load factor, over which batch jobs should not be run, instead of the compile-time choice of 0.8. For an SMP system with n CPUs, you will probably want to set this higher than n−1.
	−b		Specify the minimum interval in seconds between the start of two batch jobs (60 default).
	−d		Debug; print error messages to standard error instead of using syslog(3). This option also implies −f.
	−f		Run atd in the foreground.
	−s		Process the at/batch queue only once. This is primarily of use for compatibility with old versions of at; −n Append the hostname of the system to the subject of the e-mails sent by atd.
	atd −s		is equivalent to the old atrun command.

atd won’t work if its spool directory is mounted via NFS even if no_root_squash is set.

/var/spool/at The directory for storing jobs; this should be mode 700, owner root.

/var/spool/at/spool The directory for storing output; this should be mode 700, owner root.

/etc/at.allow, /etc/at.deny determine who can use the at system.

The functionality of atd should be merged into cron(8).