For the Acajoom Plus and PRO to send your scheduled Newsletters, Auto-responders and SmartNewsletters, you need to set up a cron task on your server.
 

The task you should setup is a call to the following url:

http://www.yoursite.com/index2.php?option=com_acajoom&act=cron 

(don't forget to replace  www.yoursite.com  by the URL of your own site)

The cron task will trigger your site every X minutes to automatically send your scheduled Newsletters, Auto-Responders or SmartNewsletters. Please read as well how to configure your Scheduler process if it's not already done.

• Free cron task
• Cron task on your own server

Free cron task easy to set up at http://www.joobisoft.com  

If you don't have access to a cron task on your control panel you can register for a free cron task at: http://www.joobisoft.com/.

Our own site will launch your Acajoom component every 15 minutes so you don't need to configure anything on your CPanel or with JCron, JoobiSoft will do the job!

1. Register and validate your account at http://www.joobisoft.com

2. Login in

3. Click on the User Menu called : My Cron

4. Create a new cron task (click on the button Add)

5. Configure your cron task (very easily!)

1. Select the type 'Acajoom' so our system will automatically create the good url to launch your Acajoom component
2. Enter the url of your website  ( http://www.yoursite.com )
3. Choose a frequency (so our website will launch your Acajoom component every X minutes)
6. Save the page
1. If you choice the type 'Acajoom', our system will automatically complete your url to launch the Acajoom component so you should now see the url http://www.yoursite.com/index2.php?option=com_acajoom&act=cron&Itemid=999

Cron task on your own server

If you rather want to use your own Cron task to launch your Acajoom component, here are some examples for different hosting control panels.

Some providers can not launch the url of the Acajoom cron task. In that case, we recommend you to use our free service on joobisoft.com .

The most popular hosting control panels are CPanel, Plesk and Interworx.

CPanel:

This is a link to a video on how to set up a cron task
http://www.2serveu.net/cpanel-tutorials/standardcron.html

Plesk:

This is a link to a video on how to set up a cron task
http://www.swsoft.com/doc/tutorials/Plesk/Plesk7/plesk_plesk7_eu/plesk7_eu_crontab.htm

Interworx:

This is a link to a video on how to set up a cron task
http://www.sagonet.com/interworx/tutorials/siteworx/cron.php

 

For general Linux crontab info click here http://www.computerhope.com/unix/ucrontab.htm#01

Setting up the command line on Unix
There are different command line programs you can use to call the page from the command line. Not all of them may be available on a given server.

• For example, you can use a Unix utility like 'wget':

wget -q -nd --delete-after 'http://www.yourwebsite.com/index2.php?option=com_acajoom&act=cron'

The options :

• -q = quiet (no message)
  
• -nd = no directory
• --delete-after = delete the downloaded file
  

Same with log file
wget -q -nd --delete-after 'http://www.yourwebsite.com/index2.php?option=com_acajoom&act=cron' -O /home/public_html/cache/dull

Note in this example that the output is thrown away (to /home/public_html/cache/dull ).

• A number of users of Acajoom have found that 'wget' sometimes fails. Especially if you have trouble with email digests not being sent on a daily basis to all users, an alternative command that solves the problem is:

Set up your cron task with cron (Unix software) :

Open a terminal, write the following comment : crontab -e

It will open the crontab for the current user. If you edit the main cron file (/etc/crontab), don't forget to add the user between the timetable and the command. Usually we write root because this user has all rights.

The syntaxe is (crontab -e):

<timetable> <command>

 Or if you edit the main cron file :

 <timetable> <user> <command>

Syntaxe of the timetable :

# +---------------- minute (0 - 59)
# |  +------------- hour (0 - 23)
# |  |  +---------- day of month (1 - 31)
# |  |  |  +------- month (1 - 12)
# |  |  |  |  +---- day of week (0 - 7) (Sunday=0 or 7)
# |  |  |  |  |
  *  *  *  *  *  command to be executed

Some examples :

Execute the cron task every 15 minutes :

*/15 * * * * wget -q -r -nd --delete-after 'http://www.yourwebsite.com/index2.php?option=com_acajoom&act=cron'

 

Execute the cron task every 15 minutes during the business days :

*/15 * * * 1-5 wget -q -r -nd --delete-after 'http://www.yourwebsite.com/index2.php?option=com_acajoom&act=cron'

 

Execute the cron task the 1st of every month

*/15 * 1 * * wget -q -r -nd --delete-after 'http://www.yourwebsite.com/index2.php?option=com_acajoom&act=cron'

Set up your cron task on DirectAdmin (Thanks to fonny.smets)

Log into DirectAdmin as user
At Advanced Features select Cronjobs
If you want a schedule every 10 minutes define as below:

Minute: */10
Hour: *
Day of Month: *
Month: *
Day of Week: *

Command: /usr/bin/curl -s -o /dev/null "http://www.yoursite.com/index2.php?option=com_acajoom&act=cron"

Important are the quotes around the URL. Otherwise all looks perfect but mail will never be send.

Set up your cron task on Windows (Thanks to Jason)

 Creating a Scheduled Task

1. Open Scheduler
2. Go to Start > Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Scheduled Tasks
3. Double-click Add Scheduled Task
4. The Scheduled Task Wizard will appear. Click Next.
5. Select the program to run. Choose your browser from the list (for example, Internet Explorer or Mozilla Firefox). Click Next.
6. Give the task a Name, such as Acajoom Cron Job, and choose the Frequency with which to perform the task (for example, Daily)). Click Next.
7. Choose specific date and time options (this step will vary, depending on the option selected in the previous step). When finished, click Next.
8. Enter your password if prompted. Change the username if required (for example, you'd like the task to run under a user with fewer privileges security reasons). Click Next.
9. On the final page, select the checkbox Open advanced properties for this task when I click Finish and click Finish.

Configuring the task

1. Go to the task's setting page either by checking the checkbox at the end of the last step, or by double-clicking on the task.
2. In the Run box, after the text that is there now (for example, C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe), enter a space and then type the address to your website's cron.php page in double
3. To set a frequency more often than Daily (for example, hourly), click the Schedule tab, then click Advanced. Here you can set options such as Repeat task, every 1 hour for 23 hours. Click Ok when finished.
4. Change the start time on the task to one minute from the current time. This will allow you to test the task and make sure that it is working.
5. When all settings have been configured to your liking, click Apply and OK (note: you may be prompted for your password)