Schedule a job from the Windows command line?

Question

On Linux there is cron job and at job. Is there a way to schedule a job from the command line on Windows?

The Task Scheduler GUI is not what I am after. I must modify a script to schedule an event upon a certain condition... so there must be a way to call this from the command line.

Answer 1

Windows also has an "at job". Albeit the syntax is a little different.

C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator>at /?
The AT command schedules commands and programs to run on a computer at
a specified time and date. The Schedule service must be running to use
the AT command.

AT [\\computername] [ [id] [/DELETE] | /DELETE [/YES]]
AT [\\computername] time [/INTERACTIVE]
    [ /EVERY:date[,...] | /NEXT:date[,...]] "command"

\\computername     Specifies a remote computer. Commands are scheduled on the
                   local computer if this parameter is omitted.
id                 Is an identification number assigned to a scheduled
                   command.
/delete            Cancels a scheduled command. If id is omitted, all the
                   scheduled commands on the computer are canceled.
/yes               Used with cancel all jobs command when no further
                   confirmation is desired.
time               Specifies the time when command is to run.
/interactive       Allows the job to interact with the desktop of the user
                   who is logged on at the time the job runs.
/every:date[,...]  Runs the command on each specified day(s) of the week or
                   month. If date is omitted, the current day of the month
                   is assumed.
/next:date[,...]   Runs the specified command on the next occurrence of the
                   day (for example, next Thursday).  If date is omitted, the
                   current day of the month is assumed.
"command"          Is the Windows NT command, or batch program to be run.

Example:

at 9:00 /interactive notepad.exe

This will cause Notepad to interactively open for the user at 9:00 in the morning.

Answer 2

Use the schtasks command. It has more options than the at command and some nice ones like /mo LASTDAY for the last day of the month:

schtasks schedules commands and programs to run periodically or at a specific time. Adds and removes tasks from the schedule, starts and stops tasks on demand, and displays and changes scheduled tasks.

Syntax:

schtasks /create /tn TaskName /tr TaskRun /sc schedule [/mo modifier]
         [/d day] [/m month[,month...] [/i IdleTime] [/st StartTime] 
         [/sd StartDate] [/ed EndDate] [/s computer [/u 
         [domain\]user /p password]] 
         [/ru {[Domain\]User | "System"} [/rp Password]] /? 

Answer 3

Write a Windows shell script to do it using a sleep program for delay:

@echo off

:loop
someprogram args
sleep 900
if somecondition goto loop

Run it in a shell window of its own. Configure cmd.exe to run on power up with this script. sleep sleeps for a number of seconds:

#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <Windows.h>

int main(int argc, char* argv[])
{
    int n = atoi(argv[1]);

    Sleep(n * 1000);

    return 0;
}