Thanks, that explains a lot. I copied over your updates and @weekly looks like it is working well now but I guess we'll see.
Regardless, I can save you some time. I have a great idea for how to fix the error messages and scripts changing and my proof of concept is almost there! I'll send you the finalised patch later. Thanks, Henri On Fri, Nov 21, 2025 at 4:28 PM Lin Qigang <[email protected]> wrote: > On Tue, 18 Nov 2025 20:33:16 +0100 Henri P <[email protected]> > wrote: > > Package: anacron > > Version: 2.3-43 > > Severity: normal > > X-Debbugs-Cc: [email protected] > > > > Dear Maintainer, > > > > The other day I made a change to a script that broke it but I decided to > fix it > > later. Much to my surprise I noticed next week that journal was flooded > with > > hourly errors from anacron! > > > Nov 13 07:32:59 host anacron[1606932]: /etc/anacrontab: Unknown named > period on > > line 13, skipping > > Nov 13 07:37:59 host anacron[1606932]: Can't find sendmail at > > /usr/bin/sendmail, not mailing output > > Nov 13 08:31:45 host anacron[1607068]: /etc/anacrontab: Unknown named > period on > > line 13, skipping > > Nov 13 08:31:45 host anacron[1607068]: Can't find sendmail at > > /usr/bin/sendmail, not mailing output > > Nov 13 09:33:15 host anacron[1607245]: /etc/anacrontab: Unknown named > period on > > line 13, skipping > > Nov 13 09:33:15 host anacron[1607245]: Can't find sendmail at > > /usr/bin/sendmail, not mailing output > > Nov 13 10:32:15 host anacron[1607501]: /etc/anacrontab: Unknown named > period on > > line 13, skipping > > Nov 13 10:32:15 host anacron[1607501]: Can't find sendmail at > > /usr/bin/sendmail, not mailing output > > Nov 13 11:34:05 host anacron[1607662]: /etc/anacrontab: Unknown named > period on > > line 13, skipping > > Nov 13 11:34:05 host anacron[1607662]: Can't find sendmail at > > /usr/bin/sendmail, not mailing output > > Nov 13 12:34:55 host anacron[1607893]: /etc/anacrontab: Unknown named > period on > > line 13, skipping > > Nov 13 12:34:55 host anacron[1607893]: Can't find sendmail at > > /usr/bin/sendmail, not mailing output > > Nov 13 13:34:00 host anacron[1608052]: /etc/anacrontab: Unknown named > period on > > line 13, skipping > > Nov 13 13:34:00 host anacron[1608052]: Can't find sendmail at > > /usr/bin/sendmail, not mailing output > > Nov 13 14:34:03 host anacron[1608198]: /etc/anacrontab: Unknown named > period on > > line 13, skipping > > Nov 13 14:34:03 host anacron[1608198]: Can't find sendmail at > > /usr/bin/sendmail, not mailing output > > Nov 13 15:32:15 host anacron[1608439]: /etc/anacrontab: Unknown named > period on > > line 13, skipping > > Nov 13 15:32:15 host anacron[1608439]: Can't find sendmail at > > /usr/bin/sendmail, not mailing output > > Nov 13 16:32:56 host anacron[1608607]: /etc/anacrontab: Unknown named > period on > > line 13, skipping > > Nov 13 16:32:56 host anacron[1608607]: Can't find sendmail at > > /usr/bin/sendmail, not mailing output > > Nov 13 17:33:15 host anacron[1608769]: /etc/anacrontab: Unknown named > period on > > line 13, skipping > > Nov 13 17:33:15 host anacron[1608769]: Can't find sendmail at > > /usr/bin/sendmail, not mailing output > > Nov 13 18:33:15 host anacron[1608941]: /etc/anacrontab: Unknown named > period on > > line 13, skipping > > Nov 13 18:33:15 host anacron[1608941]: Can't find sendmail at > > /usr/bin/sendmail, not mailing output > > Nov 13 19:30:34 host anacron[1609090]: /etc/anacrontab: Unknown named > period on > > line 13, skipping > > Nov 13 19:30:34 host anacron[1609090]: Can't find sendmail at > > /usr/bin/sendmail, not mailing output > > Nov 13 20:33:07 host anacron[1609232]: /etc/anacrontab: Unknown named > period on > > line 13, skipping > > Nov 13 20:33:07 host anacron[1609232]: Can't find sendmail at > > /usr/bin/sendmail, not mailing output > > Nov 13 21:31:02 host anacron[1609414]: /etc/anacrontab: Unknown named > period on > > line 13, skipping > > Nov 13 21:31:02 host anacron[1609414]: Can't find sendmail at > > /usr/bin/sendmail, not mailing output > > Nov 13 22:31:34 host anacron[1609579]: /etc/anacrontab: Unknown named > period on > > line 13, skipping > > Nov 13 22:31:34 host anacron[1609579]: Can't find sendmail at > > /usr/bin/sendmail, not mailing output > > Nov 13 23:32:07 host anacron[1609725]: /etc/anacrontab: Unknown named > period on > > line 13, skipping > > Nov 13 23:32:07 host anacron[1609725]: Can't find sendmail at > > /usr/bin/sendmail, not mailing output > > > > That's just one day. Look at the whole week: > > > > $ journalctl --identifier=anacron --since=-1week --priority=err | wc > --lines > > 230 > > > > It took me a while to figure out what was going on. Turns out the script > was > > used in one of my @weekly anacrontab commands. Anacron tries to mail > output > > because my script failed. I still don't know what that unknown named > period > > message is about. The big issue is that anacron can't detect if a script > > changed after it was added as a job. Please add this feature to at least > make > > the error messages more clear. > > @weekly is not supported in anacron 2.3-43, but I did recently add > support for @daily and @weekly period names in anacron 2.3-44. The error > messages still appear for other incorrect period names in anacrontab. I > will try to fix this for the next Debian release of anacron. > > Checking if a script has not changed before running a job would be > harder. I have a few ideas for what can work. > > -- > Lance Lin > GPG Fingerprint: 4A31 DB5A 1EE4 096C 8739 9880 9036 4929 4C33 F9B7 >
