Re: Something Odd - "top" Delivers Nada When Run By Crontab

On 7/11/26 23:00, rbowman wrote:
> On Sat, 11 Jul 2026 22:54:10 -0400, c186282 wrote:
> 
>> On 7/11/26 02:40, rbowman wrote:
>>> On Fri, 10 Jul 2026 23:57:54 -0400, c186282 wrote:
>>>
>>>> Wrote a short Python script that uses os.system() to run 'top' ...
>>>> redirecting the output to a file. We then clean-up the weird chars in
>>>> the file and append it to an ongoing log file.
>>>
>>> I think we've been here before...
>>>
>>> https://docs.python.org/3/library/subprocess.html
>>>
>>> Yes, it's one of those hateful, newfangled functions that might work
>>> for you.
>>
>>     Um ... there are LOTS of 'monitoring' apps for Linux at this point -
>>     just did a survey a couple of days ago. Most are serious OVER-kill.
>>     They also tend to record SO much shit that you'll never be able to
>>     find YOUR particular problem in the mess.
> 
> subprocess is not an app. It is the Python library that is recommended
> rather than the older os.system and has more flexibility but you got
> system to work so go in peace. It probably won't be deprecated and dropped
> any time soon.

   I've used subprocess quite a bit. It is theoretically
   'more capable' but can be far more complicated than
   needed. 'os.system()' is my pref wherever possible.
   If I need output from some call then subprocess will
   deliver that. In this particular case I just had the
   util dump to a temporary file. Just a few lines to
   open/read/clean the contents. No real advantage in
   using subprocess, so I didn't. KISS