WSS Blog

MySQL Database Backup

2008-05-01T15:24:00.000-07:00

Steps to setting up a regular automatic backup of your MySQL database:

Obtain or create your own script that will backup your database. A good example is this PHP script. Upload this script to your website. For additional info visit the developer's website.

Update your PHP script with your FTP account information.

Test your new script by calling the PHP file from a web browser.

If your test is successful then you are ready to login to Web Service Scheduler or sign up for a new account and create a job. Provide the URL of your PHP script and set the frequency at which you would like the script to be run.

Regularly check your pagerank

2007-10-30T19:22:00.000-07:00

You can setup a job to regularly check your Google Pagerank using this web service provided by TRYNT.

The service will return an xml result that looks like this:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<Trynt>
<Pagerank>9</Pagerank>
</Trynt>

All you need to do is paste the URL for the TRYNT API into the Execute URL field on the Job Add or Edit page.

Here is an example URL for the web service that will return the Pagerank for yahoo:

http://www.trynt.com/google-pagerank-api/v1/?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.yahoo.com

Set the frequency for once per quarter or once per month at most. Also check the box to have the results sent to your email address.

Check Domain Name Availability

2007-10-02T19:53:00.000-07:00

Use the Domain Tools XML API to check the availability of a list of domain names.

1. Create a Domain Tools account.

2. Generate a Partner ID and API Key.

3. Plan your Bulk Check query.

For details on the format of the query URL visit the following link:
http://xml-api.domaintools.com/api23.html#bulk_check

NOTE: provide your own IP address in the customer_ip variable.

4. Login to your wsscheduler.com account (or create a new account if you do not have one).
5. Create a job/task to regularly perform your WHOIS query. Place the query URL in the Execute URL field. To avoid abusing the Domain Tools API consider setting the frequency to monthly.

6. Have the results sent to your email account.

Here is an example of the result set.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?> <whoisapi> <application> <appname>bulk_check</appname> <version>2</version> <partner>partnername</partner> <key>12345-12345-12345-12345-12345</key> <customer_ip>000.000.000.000</customer_ip> </application> <request> </request> <response> <extn>COMNETORGINFOBIZUS</extn> <records_returned>1</records_returned> <d> <id>1</id> <n>wsscheduler</n> <s>wqqqqq</s> </d> </response> </whoisapi>

Blog on Autopilot

2007-09-07T11:54:00.000-07:00

Ole Wolf discusses how bloggers using MT4 can schedule future blog entries to post at a steady rate...even when your away from your computer. This requires some scheduling which can be handled quite nicely by an online script scheduler.

See the full article.

Online Scheduling Services

2007-02-02T14:11:00.000-08:00

WsScheduler.com is the solution to your scheduling problems on a web server with no access to scheduling utilities such as cron or at. It's easy to use. Just login and add the URL of the web service and the time you would like the service to run and Web Service Scheduler will take care of the rest.

Here are a few ideas of tasks you could schedule using an online scheduling service.

Perform a regular backups of critical system or user data
Generate a regular custom report for administrators or users
Email a weekly newsletter
Purge or archive old data from the database (i.e. expired articles, logs)
Disable accounts that have not paid, violated rules, overused resources, etc.
Regular testing and maintenance (link check, page validation, feed validation, etc.)
B2B transfers (update product lists, new accounts, pricing)
Post daily web links to a blog or other RSS/ATOM feed
Update website content such as the latest news, user upload lists, "Top 10" lists, submitted information, etc.

What are "cron" and "at" utilities?

2006-12-20T11:56:00.000-08:00

"cron" and "at" are services that run in the background of Unix or Windows machines (respectively). They are used to schedule the execution of applications at specific times or intervals.

Many websites run on Windows and Unix machines. Sometimes these websites have very complex processes that they carry out on a regular basis. To automate these regular tasks, webmasters and developers often implement a scheduled task using cron (sometimes referred to as crond or even crontab) or at(Windows Task Scheduler also has a command-line interface called at). However, not all web hosting providers offer access to these utilities. This is where an online service like WSScheduler.com can come in very handy.

When using an online scheduler to automate tasks, a webmaster can place programming instructions inside an ASP page, PHP page or CGI script that performs the important task. Then a regular call to the URL of the ASP/PHP/CGI resource is scheduled online. This allows for automating tasks without access to cron or at.