There are a lot of things that you could still test in production to narrow down the error possibilities:

  1. Is /usr/local/bin/distaster.pl readable by karl?
  2. Is the /usr/local/bin/distaster.pl executable by karl?
  3. Can karl outside of cron run the script?
  4. Is the hashbang line (=first line) of the script #!/usr/bin/perl?
  5. Is SELinux interfering with command execution from cron?

In reply to Re: The "Perl script on command line works but as cronjob it fails" story revisited by Corion
in thread The "Perl script on command line works but as cronjob it fails" story revisited by karlgoethebier

Title:
Use:  <p> text here (a paragraph) </p>
and:  <code> code here </code>
to format your post, it's "PerlMonks-approved HTML":


  • Posts are HTML formatted. Put <p> </p> tags around your paragraphs. Put <code> </code> tags around your code and data!
  • Titles consisting of a single word are discouraged, and in most cases are disallowed outright.
  • Read Where should I post X? if you're not absolutely sure you're posting in the right place.
  • Please read these before you post! —
  • Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags:
    a, abbr, b, big, blockquote, br, caption, center, col, colgroup, dd, del, details, div, dl, dt, em, font, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, hr, i, ins, li, ol, p, pre, readmore, small, span, spoiler, strike, strong, sub, summary, sup, table, tbody, td, tfoot, th, thead, tr, tt, u, ul, wbr
  • You may need to use entities for some characters, as follows. (Exception: Within code tags, you can put the characters literally.)
            For:     Use:
    & &amp;
    < &lt;
    > &gt;
    [ &#91;
    ] &#93;
  • Link using PerlMonks shortcuts! What shortcuts can I use for linking?
  • See Writeup Formatting Tips and other pages linked from there for more info.