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Is there any easy way to schedule repeated jobs in Mac OS X? I know I could use cron, but I'm looking for a more user friendly way to do it, a GUI for schedules, something like this.

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  • Lingon has been updated! Rejoice!
    – octern
    Commented Jun 15, 2013 at 15:02

9 Answers 9

Reset to default
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You can schedule jobs via iCal. Create an event. Edit the event, and you'll see "Run Script" and "Open File" as options as alarms.

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  • +1 for mentioning this question at superuser.com/questions/102979/… :-)
    – Arjan
    Commented Jan 31, 2010 at 19:10
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    Not anymore. Mountain Lion has broken this.
    – Robert Ryan
    Commented Jul 27, 2012 at 1:13
  • It may support the feature under ML because the event has an option for "Open File", so I presume that allows you to run custom script. But I can't, because I set up my iCal to sync with Google Calendar, and Google simply revert the notification back to default.
    – Antony
    Commented Sep 23, 2012 at 15:02
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Well, there's CronniX, Maintidget, Macaroni and MacJanitor.

alt text

Have you tried using one of the launchd instead of cron? Apparently, Apple doesn't use cron anymore.

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    Yes, use Launchd over cron!!!
    – The Tentacle
    Commented Sep 24, 2009 at 18:36
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    Lingon has been updated! Rejoice! Especially good because all of the programs linked in this post are discontinued, dead links, or more than 3 years out of date.
    – octern
    Commented Jun 15, 2013 at 14:59
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Lingon is a GUI for creating and working with launchd. It's no longer being worked on, but works well for creating and editing Launch Agents and if you are on Leopard or Snow Leopard it's the suggested method over cron.

enter image description here

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  • 1
    Lingon 3 is now available for Lion, so it is being updated.
    – Jamie Forrest
    Commented Nov 16, 2011 at 4:18
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    Lingon X is now available for Mountain Lion.
    – orome
    Commented Feb 10, 2013 at 21:00
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This solution does use crontab but makes it user-friendly by using the Automator

Adding a calendar event tends to clog up iCal for me. I'm using a combination of Automator and crontab.

On the Automator part, I'm recording each action I need to perform as an app (Automator > File > New > Application Template) and save it to a convenient location (File > Save as). Make sure you save it as an Application and not Workflow.

Then it's just a case of adding a cronjob for it:

0 * * * *  open /path/to/the/save/automator/app

Friendly would be nice, but right now I'm just looking for something that will run an application at a specified time on specified days -- or even every day -- under Snow Leopard, which ignores my old cron file.

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  • 1
    The OP wants something more user-friendly than cron, and you suggest... cron?
    – Daniel Beck ♦
    Commented Oct 29, 2010 at 11:33
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    Mea culpa! I was only trying to provide my solution to this problem.
    – Paul Ardeleanu
    Commented Oct 29, 2010 at 11:53
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    It is conceivable that the OP thought cron was difficult, so showing that it is a one-liner may be informative.
    – rocketsarefast
    Commented Jun 22, 2013 at 19:08
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You could try Auto Scheduled Task for Mac http://www.readmesoft.com/mac

Run an application, open a file, or apple script, automator workflow by schedule

It's a GUI tool and easy to use:

Auto Scheduled Tasks software screen

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  • Just tried this one, worked fine :) The UI is not very modern, but I don't really care in this case.
    – BoD
    Commented May 4, 2014 at 16:18
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There is also Scheduler for Mac at www.macscheduler.net. I am the developer of it. :) User feedback is appreciated. And one more thing... It's free.

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  • 2
    Welcome to Super User! Please read: How do I recommend software in my answers?
    – slhck
    Commented Sep 14, 2013 at 9:36
  • None of these tools work. I have S3tools installed for backup to Amazon. It works from command line, but it's not an "application". A couple of commands work just fine for me, but there's no way of using the same thing in GUI, including your tool.
    – PKHunter
    Commented Oct 1, 2015 at 22:15
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Have a look at Task Till Down.

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  • Requires Java, which is no longer installed with OS X by default.
    – Daniel Beck ♦
    Commented Feb 17, 2012 at 16:40
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How about Crontooie, a GUI frontend for cron:

alt text

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For those who might read this today (11/24/19)

Lingon still works!!! And it's NOT been abandoned. Works for Hight Sierra, Mojave and Catalina

Lingon for High Sierra and later

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  • Why would anyone downvote such a helpful comment? It's dated, refers to the relevant OS, and includes a link.
    – kd4ttc
    Commented Dec 6, 2019 at 16:02

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