InspectScheduled
Run automations on a recurring schedule.
Add a schedule
Select Recurring schedule under Add trigger. Under Run schedule, describe when to run in plain language, such as weekdays at 9 AM or every Monday at 8:30, or enter a cron expression such as 0 9 * * 1-5. Inspect converts plain-language schedules to cron and shows the result below the field; select Use cron syntax (the arrow) to replace your text with the cron expression. For a cron expression, it shows a readable description instead.
Choose a Timezone for the schedule. New schedules default to Eastern time, and the schedule follows daylight saving changes in the selected timezone.
Cron syntax
Cron expressions use five fields: minute, hour, day of month, month, and day of week.
| Expression | Runs |
|---|---|
0 9 * * 1-5 | Weekdays at 9:00 |
30 8 * * 1 | Mondays at 8:30 |
0 */4 * * * | Every four hours, on the hour |
0 17 1 * * | The first of each month at 17:00 |
When runs start
A scheduled run can start up to a minute after its scheduled time so that automations sharing a schedule do not all start at once.
Add more than one schedule when an automation needs times that one expression cannot describe, such as weekdays at 9:00 and Saturdays at 12:00. Pause a schedule from its trigger to stop it without deleting it; disabling the automation stops all of its schedules.
Run on demand
Automations can also run manually from Run in the automations list, whether or not they have a schedule. When the automation has template variables, Inspect asks for their values before starting the run.
Example
A weekday schedule at 5:00 can scan a repository for stale feature flags, then use automation_state to remember which flags it already proposed so later runs only report new findings.