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Setting up Position Miner Schedules in Rank
Exec
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| Summary |
Detail |
| Introduction |
Rank Exec uses Windows Task Scheduler to run automated
sessions with Position Miner. By doing this, we eliminate the need to start
another process on your machine, as, typically, the Task Scheduler Service is
already running. You can start Task Scheduler in one of three ways:
- Directly from the Control Panel.
- From the Rank Exec Menu--Settings | Schedule Position Miner...
- Or after the Setup Wizard is closed, Rank Exec will prompt you if you want
to run Task Scheduler.
In Windows 98 and above, if the Task Scheduling service is not started, Rank
Exec will start it for you. You will, however, need to manually start it
permanently as it will be disabled again after the next computer restart.
Scheduling Position Miner Sessions gives you the ability to have search engine
ranking done discretely during business off-hours. When running particularly
large projects, or many of them, it may be desirable not to tie up Internet
bandwidth, or processor on the machine being used. Additionally, by scheduling
repeated sessions, the data retrieved will be more meaningful from a
chronological perspective. In other words, when looking at a chart, for
example, values in the chart will have more value if the timeline is evenly
distributed, rather then if Position Miner was simply run manually at will.
This examples assumes you are using the Task Scheduler from Windows XP.
This also assumes you have a project created in Rank Exec. For this example, we
will be using a project called "Widget".
Opening the Task Scheduler as described above. |
| Opening the Scheduler |
From My Computer open the Control Panel.
Open Scheduled Tasks.
If Scheduled Tasks does not exist in the Control Panel, you may need to install
it.
Click "Add Scheduled Task"
and follow the wizard to the second screen where you are to add the
executable. |
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The executable you are looking for is PositionMiner.exe.
Typically this will be found in your C:\\Program Files\Rank Exec folder. This
will take you to the next screen where you will add a Schedule name. You will
probably want to use the same name as the name of the Rank Exec project you are
going to run.
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| Scheduling times and frequency |
In the same screen you can select Daily, Weekly, Monthly,
etc.. Click Next to continue. Depending on which cycle you picked, the next
screen will require you to select a time of day, day of week, etc. |
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Click Next to enter your user name (normally, use the default
that appears) and your Windows password. |
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Click the "Open advanced properties...". This is
where you will apply projects to the executable. |
| Adding the project to run |
On the first tab, "Task", you will see something
like "C:\\Program Files\Rank Exec" . You will want to append that
line with the project you want run. If the project is Widget, then the Run
command should look like:
"C:\\Program Files\Rank Exec\PositionMiner.exe" "Widget"
Use the quotes
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Make sure the appropriate boxes are checked at the bottom of
the current tab. Make any additional changes needed in either the
"Schedule" or "Settings" tabs. |
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Click OK to save the schedule. Position Miner will now run at
the time(s) you assigned. You can setup multiple schedules with different
projects. |
| Tip |
Do not schedule sessions that risk running over each other.
Position Miner cannot have more than one instance running at a time. If there
is already a session runnning and you try to run another, it will not run and
the Task Scheduler will show a "Last Result" (this can be found as
one of the columns in the main screen of Scheduled Tasks) of 0x99. Instead, run
multiple projects in one session. |
| Technique |
To Run multiple projects in one session, simply append
projects to the end of the Run command. If you have three projects, Widget1,
Widget2 and Widget3 it would look something like this:
"C:\\Program Files\Rank Exec\PositionMiner.exe"
"Widget1" "Widget2" "Widget3"
Use the quotes
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