PROTO(5)

NAME
proto - prototype job file for at

SYNOPSIS

/var/spool/cron/.proto

/var/spool/cron/.proto.queue

DESCRIPTION

When a job is submitted to at or batch, (see at(1)) the job is constructed as a shell script. First, a prologue is constructed, consisting of:

•   A header specifying the owner, job name, and shell that should be used to run the job, and a flag indicating whether mail should be sent when the job completes;

•   A set of Bourne shell commands to make the environment (see environ(5V)) for the at job the same as the current environment;

•   A command to run the user's shell (as specified by the SHELL environment variable) with the rest of the job file as input.

at then reads a “prototype file,” and constructs the rest of the job file from it.

Text from the prototype file is copied to the job file, except for special “variables” that are replaced by other text:

    $d  is replaced by the current working directory
    $l  is replaced by the current file size limit (see ulimit(3C))
    $m  is replaced by the current umask (see umask(2V))
    $t  is replaced by the time at which the job should be run, expressed as seconds since January 1, 1970, 00:00 Greenwich Mean Time, preceded by a colon
    $<  is replaced by text read by at from the standard input (that is, the commands provided to at to be run in the job)

If the job is submitted in queue queue, at uses the file /var/spool/cron/.proto.queue as the prototype file if it exists, otherwise it will use the file /var/spool/cron/.proto.

EXAMPLES
The standard .proto file supplied with SunOS is:

    #
    # @(#)proto.5 1.1 92/07/30 SMI; from S5R3 1.1
    #
    cd $d
    umask $m
    $<

which causes commands to change the current directory in the job to the current directory at the time at was run, and to change the umask in the job to the umask at the time at was run, to be inserted before the commands in the job.

FILES
/var/spool/cron/.proto
/var/spool/cron/.proto.queue

SEE ALSO
at(1)