[cobalt-users] Crontab Editing Question

[Barbara <thebizworkers@xxxxxxxxx>]

Hi,

This may sound like a silly question, but what is the
difference between editing your crontab (/etc/crontab)
via your fav text editor -vs- doing it by issuing
"crontab -e"..?

The man pages for crontab say this about the '-e'
option:

The -e option is used to edit the current crontab
using the editor specified by the VISUAL or  EDITOR 
environment variables.  After you exit from the
editor, the modified crontab will be installed
automatically.

But for years anytime I needed to edit something on my
crontab, I've simply logged in as root and opened
crontab in my fav editor (vi), then saved the changes
when done - I've never had any problem doing it this
way..

I'm just curious as to if using the "-e" option is
better/more proper, or if it really matters..?


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