Linux Web Hosting
Linux web hosting includes the following: Shared, Reseller, VPS and Dedicated. The commands below are compatible with Shared Reseller, SEO hosting and VPS and Deddicated Servers with Easy Apache 3 installed; these commands will not work on Windows Hosting or VPS with Plesk.
Command line examples only! Bold sections must be changed.
Note: You may need to adjust /home/ to /home#/ depending on the home directory on which your account resides. To view the home directory for your account simply view the stats column on the main cPanel page of your account, and look for the home directory.
PHP
Command to run a PHP5 cron job:
php /home/username/public_html/cron.php
Optional flags are sometimes required for a PHP cron job:
php -q /home/username/public_html/cron.php
Command to run a PHP4 cron job:
/usr/local/php4/bin/php /home/strong>username/public_html/cron.php
Command to use a specific php.ini file:
php -c /home/username/public_html/php.ini /home/username/public_html/myscript.php
Command to GET a remote file:
/usr/bin/GET http://www.example.com/file.php
Perl
Command to run a CGI cron job:
perl /home/username/public_html/cgi-bin/file.pl
SSH
Command to run a code script cron job:
/bin/sh /home/username/public_html/file.sh
MySQL
Note: It is a good practice to not type your password out in the follow commands but to simply use the -p flag alone and have the system prompt you for the password. This is way your password stays secure and is never on the server as plain text.
Command to import a database:
mysql -u mysql_user -ppassword database_name < backup.sql
Command to export a database:
mysqldump -u mysql_user -ppassword database_name > backup.sql
Custom Installations without Easy Apache 3 (VPS/Dedicated)
PHP
Command to run for a PHP5 cron job:
/usr/local/php5/bin/php5 /home/username/public_html/cron.php
Command to run for a PHP4 cron job:
/usr/bin/php /home/username/public_html/cron.php
Since you can't view /var/log/cron on shared servers, this is the only way to see if there is an error when your script runs.
Probably a no brainer for the experienced, but would have saved me a lot of time had I known sooner. :-)