# Cron Job Log File With Timestamp

**URL:** <https://forum.mautic.org/t/cron-job-log-file-with-timestamp/23444>\
**Category:** Product Support\
**Created:** [March 31, 2022, 11:43pm UTC](https://forum.mautic.org/t/cron-job-log-file-with-timestamp/23444 "2022-03-31T23:43:35Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![gbensonii](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/user_avatar/forum.mautic.org/gbensonii/32/7258_2.png) [@gbensonii](https://forum.mautic.org/u/gbensonii)\
**Post date:** [March 31, 2022, 11:43pm UTC](https://forum.mautic.org/t/cron-job-log-file-with-timestamp/23444/1 "2022-03-31T23:43:35Z")

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**Your software**  
My Mautic version is: 4.2.1  
My PHP version is: 7.4.28  
My Database type and version is: mysqli - 10.2.43-MariaDB

**Your problem**  
I have successfully setup cron jobs in CPANEL for all of the necessary functions.

A question I have is this:

When looking at the cronjob path:

/usr/local/bin/php /home/frugal52/public\_html/EMAIL-mautic/bin/console mautic:segments:update \> /dev/null 2\>&1

I see the part at the end “\> /dev/null 2\>&1” and have learned that this discards the cronjob output.

I have successfully tried outputing that to a logfile I created by changing it the following:  
/usr/local/bin/php /home/frugal52/public\_html/EMAIL-mautic/bin/console mautic:segments:update \>\> /home/frugal52/logs-cronjobs/segments-update.txt 2\>&1

This works and appends the log file as desired, however, It does not provide a timestamp for each entry. Is there an easy way to do this through cpanel?

Thanks in advance for your help and suggestions!

- George

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![gbensonii](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/user_avatar/forum.mautic.org/gbensonii/32/7258_2.png) [@gbensonii](https://forum.mautic.org/u/gbensonii)\
**Post date:** [April 2, 2022, 8:04am UTC](https://forum.mautic.org/t/cron-job-log-file-with-timestamp/23444/2 "2022-04-02T08:04:50Z")

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So I did some research and came up with an answer for my situation that I thought I would share in case it helps others.

First Off - let me describe my setup. I am hosting my Mautic installation on a VPS with root access. My hosting company is Inmotion Hosting. The setup uses WHM / CPANEL.

This method appends to the beginning of a given log file the contents of a divider-entry.txt file then pipes a date/timestamp entry to the log file and then pipes the results of running the Mautic Command to said log file. The steps I took are below:

FIRST: I created a folder under my HOME directory “/home/[USERNAME]/logs-cronjobs” where I store my log files. I also put inside that folder a text file named divider-entry.txt that contains some text such as the following (NOTE THAT LINE 1 & 3 ARE BLANK WITH A CARRIAGE RETURN OR ENTER):

> LINE 1: " "  
> LINE 2: “X-----DIVIDER BETWEEN CRON JOB ENTRIES-----X”  
> LINE 3: " "

SECOND: I then setup the cron job from the cPanel as follows:  
MINUTE=0,15,30,45  
HOUR=\*  
DAY=\*  
MONTH=\*  
WEEKDAY=\*

COMMAND=

> cat /home/[USERNAME]/logs-cronjobs/divider-entry.txt \>\> /home/[USERNAME]/logs-cronjobs/segments-update.txt 2\>&1 && date \>\> /home/[USERNAME]/logs-cronjobs/segments-update.txt 2\>&1 && /usr/local/bin/php /home/[USERNAME]/public\_html/EMAIL-mautic/bin/console mautic:segments:update \>\> /home/[USERNAME]/logs-cronjobs/segments-update.txt 2\>&1

The resulting output looks something like this:

> X-----DIVIDER BETWEEN CRON JOB ENTRIES-----X
> 
> Fri Apr 1 22:01:01 EDT 2022  
> Rebuilding contacts for segment 1  
> 0 total contact(s) to be added in batches of 300  
> 0 total contact(s) to be removed in batches of 300  
> 0 contact(s) affected
> 
> X-----DIVIDER BETWEEN CRON JOB ENTRIES-----X
> 
> Fri Apr 1 22:15:02 EDT 2022  
> Rebuilding contacts for segment 1  
> 0 total contact(s) to be added in batches of 300  
> 0 total contact(s) to be removed in batches of 300  
> 0 contact(s) affected

**NOTE:** You can also replace the “cat /home/[USERNAME]/logs-cronjobs/divider-entry.txt \>\> /home/[USERNAME]/logs-cronjobs/segments-update.txt 2\>&1” with “echo “XXXXX----NEW ENTRY----XXXXX” \>\> /home/frugal52/logs-cronjobs/segments-update.txt 2\>&1” and get a similar result except without the spaces.

I hope this helps others who want to do something similar.

Have a Great Day!  
😀  
GEORGE

**“The persistent exercise of a little extra effort is one of the most powerful forces contributing to success” - Grit**