Mac OS X Panther in a Nutshell, 2nd Edition

Name

at

Synopsis

at [options] [time] [date] [+ increment]

Executes commands entered on standard input at a specified time and optional date. (See also batch and crontab.) End input with EOF. time can be formed either as a numeric hour (with optional minutes and modifiers) or as a keyword. date can be formed either as a month and date, a day of the week, or a special keyword. increment is a positive integer followed by a keyword. See the following lists for details.

at won’t run until you first enable atrun by uncommenting its line in /etc/crontab.

Options

-f file

Execute commands listed in file.

-m

Send mail to user after job is completed (if an MTA such as sendmail is configured to run).

-q queuename

Schedule the job in queuename. Values for queuename are the lowercase letters a through l. Queue a is the default queue for at jobs. Queue b is the queue for batch jobs. Queues with higher letters run with increased niceness (receive less priority).

Time

hh:mm [modifiers]

Hours can have one or two digits (a 24-hour clock is assumed by default); optional minutes can be given as one or two digits; the colon can be omitted if the format is h, hh, or hhmm; e.g., valid times are 5, 5:30, 0530, and 19:45. If modifier am or pm is added, time is based on a 12-hour clock.

midnight | noon | now | teatime

Use any one of these keywords in place of a numeric time. now must be followed by an increment. teatime is 4:00 P.M.

Date

month num [year] | MM / DD / YY | DD.MM.YY

month is one of the 12 months, ...