Installing Moodle 

First, test that the script works by running it directly from your browser: 

http://example.com/moodle/admin/cron.php 

Now, you need to set up some way of running the script automatically and regularly.  

On Windows systems 

The simplest way is to use the little package moodle cron for windows.zip                   

(http://moodle.org/download/modules/moodle cron for windows.zip) which makes this 

whole thing very easy by installing a small Windows service. Run it and forget about it! 

On web hosting services 

Your web based control panel may have a web page that allows you to set up this 

cron process. For example, on a Cpanel system, look for a button called "Cron jobs". 

In there you can put the same sort of Unix commands as listed below.  

Using the command line on Unix  

There are different command line programs you can use to call the page from the 

command line. Not all of them may be available on a given server. For example, you 

can use a Unix utility like  wget : 

wget  q  O /dev/null http://example.com/moodle/admin/cron.php 

Note in this example that the output is thrown away (to /dev/null). The same thing  

using lynx: 

lynx  dump http://example.com/moodle/admin/cron.php > /dev/null 

Alternatively you could use a standalone version of PHP, compiled to be run on the 

command line. The advantage with doing this is that your web server logs aren t filled 

with constant requests to cron.php. The disadvantage is that you need to have access 

to a command line version of php. 

/opt/bin/php /web/moodle/admin/cron.php 

Using the crontab program on Unix  

All that Cpanel does is provide a web interface to a Unix utility  known  as  crontab.         

If you have a command line, you can set up crontab yourself using the command: 

crontab  e 

and then adding one of the above commands like: 

*/5 * * * * wget  q  O /dev/null http://example.com/moodle/admin/cron.php 

Usually, the "crontab" command will put you into the  vi  editor. You enter "insert 

mode" by pressing "i", then type in the  line  as  above,  then  exit  insert  mode  by             

pressing ESC. You save and exit by typing ":wq", or quit without saving using 

":q!" (without the quotes). 

http://moodle.org 

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