www.example.com/cron.php gives you a blank page when successfully run. User unfriendly.

I'm sure there's a nicer way of doing things that will make everyone happy. :)

Anisa.

Comments

Anonymous’s picture

(not verified) commented

As discussed on drupal-docs, testing against the User-Agent string and outputting a page/drupal_set_message if it is a regular web browser would be a good thing.

jhriggs’s picture

jhriggs commented

Or just provide a way to disable success messages (i.e. /cron.php?quiet=1) in which case only errors will be reported and success results in a blank page...just like today.

elv’s picture

elv commented
Status: Active » Postponed (maintainer needs more info)

Cron is not supposed to be run by hitting it's URL, and I suppose a cron shouldn't return anything when it's launched by the server.
Also, if you really want to fire it manually, you can do so at yourwebsite/admin/logs/status/run-cron instead of yourwebsite/cron.php, then you have a feedback message. So, it's tempting to set the issue to "by design", unless someone thinks there should be an easier way to launch a cron.

cosmicdreams’s picture

cosmicdreams commented

I wouldn't, but won't fix is also tempting.

gaele’s picture

gaele commented
Status: Postponed (maintainer needs more info) » Closed (works as designed)

cron.php can be run by an anonymous user. That's by design. Showing error messages to anonymous users would be a security hole.

sethviebrock’s picture

sethviebrock commented
Project: » Drupal core
Version: » 6.x-dev
Component: usability » cron system

You don't have to give an entire stack trace with system details: just output "OK" if cron ran successfully, otherwise "ERROR" (so that a system admin can be notified and figure out what's going on). This should be configurable so that someone truly concerned about a binary (yay/boo) error message posing a security threat can turn it off, and the rest of us can benefit from being allowed to easily monitor the health of our systems without installing some cron++ module to do so. Page text checking is common in system wellness checks. You could even <!-- --> the output.