Question

I need urgent help in this regard. I am trying to run a Python script via cron job on cPanel. The web hosting server is using cPanel Version 11.30.3 (build 5). The cron job is set successfully and it is executing the file, but the file failed because of the following error which I recieved on email:

/bin/sh: /home/someuser/public_html/xml_feed/cron_job_wod.py: /usr/bin/python
: bad interpreter: No such file or directory

What I have done so far:

1. I have placed cron_job_wod.py under public_html/xml_feed/cron_job_wod.py with all permission 777 code
2. I have added this #!/usr/bin/python at top of my script
3. I have added appache handler called cgi-script with extensions .cgi .py .pl

…but still the script is not working. How could I get the right path of the Python interpreter? or what is the solution for this problem? Please help!

Answer 1

Note that in the error message, there is a line break after /usr/bin/python and before the : that clarifies the message. This suggests that the operating system is seeking the file not at /usr/bin/python but at /usr/bin/python<newline>.

Most likely, you copied the python file from a Windows system which has a style of linebreaks that /bin/sh is not expecting to see in your script.

You can solve this problem by converting the Windows-style newlines in the python script file with the following command.

dos2unix /home/someuser/public_html/xml_feed/cron_job_wod.py

If dos2unix is not available on your system, here are a list of alternative methods that effect the same change.