cywin bash script command not found when called from batch

Question

#!/bin/bash
echo "Testing"
cd "/cygdrive/x/Internal Communications/Riccardo/"
filename=htdocs-`date +%A`.tar.gz
tar cvzf $filename "/cygdrive/c/Program Files/Zend/Apache2/htdocs"

The above script is working when it is called inside cygwin console, but when I try to call it from a batch file I get "command not found" for date and tar command. I think that bash.exe does not have the PATH set up.

I need to run that script from that batch file because I want to add the script to the task scheduler.

Answer 1

FWIW, Cygwin has cron.

Are you calling your script like this?

bash --login -i ./myscript.sh

Answer 2

As has already been said, you need to add the Cygwin binaries to your path. To do so, right click on "My Computer", click "Properties", then "Advanced", then "Environment Variables".

Create a new environment variable with name "CYGWIN_HOME" and value "C:\cygwin" (or wherever you installed cygwin. The default location is "C:\cygwin\" so this should probably work for you).

Then edit the environment variable named "PATH", and tack on the following to the end:

;%CYGWIN_HOME%\bin;%CYGWIN_HOME%\sbin;%CYGWIN_HOME%\usr\bin;%CYGWIN_HOME%\usr\sbin;%CYGWIN_HOME%\usr\local\bin;%CYGWIN_HOME%\usr\local\sbin

Close your command prompt, then reopen it. The cygwin binaries should now be available. You can double-check this by typing "which bash". It should report the location of your bash executable.

Answer 3

Put your cygwin bin directory (likely C:\cygwin\bin) on your PATH environment variable.

This would also give you the benefit of being able to use commands like tar, ls, rm, etc. from a regular console windows and not just a Cygwin console.