Cron
The Linux way to schedule commands.
http://www.adminschoice.com/crontab-quick-reference
Setting up a script to run a script in your home folder every five minutes (and log it)
crontab -e
and edit it to something like:
*/5 * * * * /home/mmurtaugh/xpub.sh > /home/mmurtaugh/xpub.log
This runs the script xpub.sh every 5 minutes, and writes its outputs to xpub.log.
Log errors
You can let your program its STDOUT to a logfile, to see if your cronjob works.
Tip: use "append", with double ">>", to see if it is running:
*/5 * * * * /home/mmurtaugh/xpub.sh >> /home/mmurtaugh/xpub.log
Then, you can add 2>&1 to the end of your line, to write STDERR to STDOUT as well. So in other words: it catches any errors and writes them to your log file.
*/5 * * * * /home/mmurtaugh/xpub.sh >> /home/mmurtaugh/xpub.log 2>&1