Hey everyone! I'm on the hunt for a straightforward tool to schedule and monitor my scripts. I've tried Powershell Universal, but the free version limits me to hourly scheduling, which isn't ideal for my needs. I've seen some other options, but they either seem complicated or come with a price tag. Is there no simple solution out there besides PowerShell Universal and Task Scheduler that allows for minute-based scheduling, monitoring, and logging of scripts?
5 Answers
It really depends on your specific needs. Personally, I find GitLab to be a great fit. You can use cron syntax to schedule your pipeline runs, and setting up a GitLab instance along with a runner is pretty straightforward.
You might be overcomplicating things! For lightweight needs, Windows Task Scheduler is reliable and supports minute-based scheduling. If you're looking for something that runs in the background, consider using NSSM to turn your script into a service. That way, it can restart automatically if it fails. Alternatively, there are open-source job schedulers available if you’re up for a little setup! PowerShell Universal is cool, but if you don't need dashboards, Task Scheduler plus good logging works for most cases.
If you’re looking for Windows solutions, the Task Scheduler is still a solid choice. You can set it up for minute-based schedules by tweaking the triggers appropriately, and while the logging can be a little tricky to find, enabling the 'History' option and redirecting output to a log file works well. If you're feeling adventurous, you could even create a custom PowerShell script that runs every minute to check what needs to be executed.
For a free option, you might want to check out Ansible AWX, but it does require a bit of a learning curve. Just a heads up!
Have you considered using Jenkins? It's a dedicated automation server with a user-friendly GUI. It supports a wide range of plugins for domain authentication, RBAC, and it can easily schedule and run your PowerShell scripts. It's super versatile!
Totally agree! Jenkins makes automation a breeze.