Re: Should we add jitter to cron(8) ?

On November 2, 2026 8:28:09 PM GMT+02:00, "Enji Cooper (yaneurabeya)" <yaneurabeya@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> On Nov 2, 2026, at 9:10 AM, Jamie Landeg-Jones <jamie@catflap.org> wrote:
>> 
>> Peter Jeremy <peterj@FreeBSD.org> wrote:
>> 
>>> IMO, it would be useful to have a way of saying e.g. "run once an hour
>>> but I don't care when within the hour".
>> 
>> I assume that the time within the hour would be the same each hour? If so,
>> that would be useful.
>> 
>> But would than initial state random number be stored somewhere, or reset
>> each time cron starts?
>
><2 cents> (deflated)
>It would probably be better if the state was tracked at the system level instead of in the application itself.
>
>As a bonus, employing jitter might improve overall system-level entropy, depending on how jobs are run and when, which could help cryptography some.
></2 cents>
>
>Thanks,
>-Enji

what if (embedded) system with read-only filesystem reboots?