$Id: README,v 1.2 2004/05/06 00:15:40 hackworth Exp $


                               Chronic 
            A constraints-based, opportunistic scheduler 
                     in the spirit of ``cron''


Introduction

    Chronic is a constraints-based, opportunistic, application-level
    scheduler. Unlike cron, that schedules according to a time
    specification, Chronic schedules tasks when specified constraints are
    met. In other words, Chronic schedules during a window of opportunity
    when the circumstances are favorable.

    The original motivation for Chronic was for me to be able to schedule
    high-impact, recurring tasks like updatedb, emerge rsync, webalizer
    when I was away from the computer, and my computer mostly idling. This
    proved to be useful enough to abstract the notion of a "constraint"
    and build an opportunistic scheduler that schedules according to
    combinations of arbitrary constraints. The current version of Chronic
    natively contains the following constraints: System Inactivity, Disk
    I/O & Load Average. Other constraints planned for new future include:
    Network IO activity, cron (which emulates cron), and existence of new
    files under a directory.


Availability 

    Chronic is distributed through CPAN (http://cpan.org) and through
    SourceForge (http://sourceforge.net/projects/chronic/)

    The latest development version can be checked out of SourceForge 
    CVS.


Installation

    Chronic is written in Perl and requires a recent version of perl5
    interpreter. If you are not running a stone age unix, a perl5
    interpreter should already be installed on your system. Otherwise, 
    you can find one at http://www.cpan.org.

    Follow the following instructions to build and install Chronic.

        tar zxvf Chronic-v.vv.tar.gz 
        cd Chronic-v.vv
        perl Makefile.PL
        make
        su 
        make install

    ``chronicd'' should now be installed on your system.


Usage 

    Chronic tasks and constraints are specified in a ``chrontab'' file
    located either in /etc/chrontab or under $HOME/.chrontab. A sample
    chrontab is located under the docs directory inside the Chronic
    distribution.

    For further help, see the chronicd manpage.


Author

    Vipul Ved Prakash <mail@vipul.net>


License 

    Chronic is distributed under the Artistic License. See ARTISTIC
    for details.



