Checking for package updates via cron(8)
Similar to syspatch(8) with the -c switch, the following script supports checking for updates to packages suitable for cron(8).
This script will run 'pkg_add -Uun' to determine which packages would have been updated and stores the result. It then removes packages starting with 'quirks' (a required package on OpenBSD) and determines how many remain. If there are no packages, return 0, otherwise, echo the package names and return 2. Returning 0 or 2 is significant because crontab(5) with the -n switch determines whether to send mail. Since we are likely to run this nightly, we do not want to flood our inbox with output from cron when there is no action to take. By exiting with a non-zero (2) exit status when there are packages, we can ensure we only get email if there are package updates.
#!/bin/ksh
PACKAGES=`/usr/sbin/pkg_add -Uun`
NOQUIRKS=`/bin/echo $PACKAGES | grep -e '^quirks' -v | /usr/bin/wc -l`
if [ "$NOQUIRKS" -eq "0" ]; then
/bin/echo "No package updates available
return 0
else
/bin/echo $PACKAGES
return 2
fi
Save the above script to '/usr/local/bin/pkg_update' and run the following commands for the proper user/group ownership and permissions.
$ doas chmod 755 /usr/local/bin/pkg_update $ doas chown root:bin /usr/local/bin/pkg_update
We now need to add it to root's crontab.
$ doas crontab -e
At the bottom add the following line:
0 0 * * * -ns /usr/local/bin/pkg_update
Notice the -n switch to not mail on a successful run. We have purposefully setup the script to have a non-successful (non-zero) exit when there are no packages to update thus generating the email.
You may also opt to add this script to /etc/daily.local with the single line:
/usr/local/bin/pkg_update
However, it should be noted that this script is designed with return values for direct use in crontab. If being called from the /etc/daily script, you'll likely want to add some additional messages to be echoed either in the script directly or in /etc/daily.local.
It is highly recommended to setup a user account where root's email can be forwarded. See afterboot(8) section 'Mail aliases'.