Automatic Update

Question

I simply want a script that runs a few update commands. I want them to happen at 3am every day.

I cannot figure out why they don't work. I added this like to crontab -e

0 3 * * * root /etc/cron.custom/update

The script in the update file is

#!/bin/bash
# if not root, run as root
if (( $EUID != 0 )); then
    sudo /home/jb/bash/update.sh
    exit
fi
apt-get update
dietpi-update
apt-get -y upgrade
apt-get -y dist-upgrade
apt-get clean
apt-get -y autoremove
reboot

I don't know how to make scripts so I found that off the internet. It is surprisingly hard to find any answers on how to edit anything to do with cron.

Unattended upgrades doesn't upgrade everything so before anyone recommends it I tried it already and it missed heaps constantly.

In short how do I auto update and upgrade my device?

Running Debian (DietPi).

Answer 1

Create the folders needed then nano and crontab. Done.

sudo nano /home/jb/scripts/update

#!/bin/bash
apt-get update ; apt-get -y upgrade ; apt-get -y dist-upgrade ; apt-get clean ; apt-get -y autoremove ; reboot

sudo crontab -e

0 3 * * * sudo bash /home/jb/scripts/update

Answer 2

(I can fully confirm your allegations from my own experience. Just recently I tried to make some cronjobs work on Raspbian and none of them worked in any standard way of setting up crontab.)

Now here is what you have to do, just copy&paste most of this:

mkdir /home/jb/scripts
sudo cp /etc/cron.custom/update /home/jb/scripts/
sudo crontab -e

Add the following to the now opened crontab: 0 3 * * * sudo bash /home/jb/scripts/update

Exit crontab.

(YES, the sudo HAS to be added, even though the crontab -e is already in sudo mode...)

Also change the update file to:

#!/bin/bash
apt-get update dietpi-update apt-get -y upgrade apt-get -y dist-upgrade apt-get clean apt-get -y autoremove reboot