Schedule Trigger
Description
Launches a task at the date, time or interval specified. Can be used for scheduling tasks to run at night or at the end of every work-day, week, month or other time frame. Includes a comprehensive list of pre-defined intervals in which to select from or custom schedules can be created, at which case, a task will run only during the custom dates/times specified.
Exclusions
The Schedule trigger enables selection of specific dates, times or intervals in which to exclude from the current schedule, such as specific days of the week (for example, exclude Tuesdays), month (for example, exclude the 1st of every month) or year (for example, exclude 1st of the year), or specific time ranges.
The Schedule trigger also includes an intuitive rescheduling feature to deal with tasks that failed to launch at their normally scheduled date/time due to a powered down server/workstation or non-responsive Automate Desktop Task Service, often times attributed to a power outage or system maintenance. In such cases, tasks can be set to run immediately after the Automate Desktop Task Service is restarted or on the next day relative to the time it was originally scheduled to launch. In addition, this trigger can be used in conjunction with the Holidays feature to enable/disable task execution during the holidays or custom events specified.
Practical usage
The most commonly used trigger. Ideal for scheduling routine tasks to run hourly, daily, weekly, monthly, at night, or during off peak hours, or by way of a custom schedule.
Parameters
General
Property | Type | Description |
---|---|---|
Interval | Options | The
time interval on which the schedule will be based. For example,
if the task should run daily, select Days.
If it should run once a week on Friday, select Specific
days of the week. If it should run twice a month, select
Specific days of the month.
Parameters vary depending on which interval is selected. The available
options are:
|
Every | Number | The numeric value corresponding to the option selected in the Interval parameter. |
Next launch date | Date/Time | The
date/time this trigger will initially launch. It also determines
the relative launch date/time of tasks that are set to run upon
a specific interval. To use the current date and time, press Now. This will cause the task
to trigger as soon as it is saved (whether or not exclusions are
set). NOTE: This parameter is not present if Custom
Date is selected as the interval. |
Exclude
Property | Type | Description |
---|---|---|
Do not trigger task | Options | Enables
selection of specific intervals in which to exclude from
the current schedule, such as specific days of the week (for example,
exclude Tuesdays), specific days of the month (for example, exclude the
1st of every month), precise date (for example, exclude May 3, 2014),
specific holidays (for example, exclude New Year Day) or specific time
range (for example, exclude between 12:00 AM - 06:00 AM). To set an exclusion, click the Add button and select the type of exclusion under the Do not trigger task parameter. The entries that appear may change depending on which interval is selected. Multiple exclusions are supported. The available options are:
NOTE: When multiple
exclusions are specified, an OR condition is applied (as opposed
to an AND condition), whereas, the task will not run upon reaching
any one of the excluded intervals. |
End Date
Property | Type | Description |
---|---|---|
End Date | Date/Time | If enabled, causes the trigger to disable itself once the selected date/time occurs (disabled by default). To immediately end trigger activity, click Now. |
Rescheduling
Property | Type | Description |
---|---|---|
When the trigger is late | Options | Specifies
what Automate Desktop should do when the schedule trigger is late (usually
due to the computer being turned off or the Automate Desktop service being
stopped). The available options are:
|
Reschedule the trigger | Options | Specifies
rescheduling options to select from. The available options are:
|
Behavior
Property | Type | Description |
---|---|---|
Enable Trigger | Yes/No | If selected, the trigger will immediately be active upon creation. If disabled, the trigger will stay inactive until it is manually enabled. This parameter is selected by default. |
Additional notes
AMTrigger
When this trigger is activated, it automatically passes the AMTrigger object to the task. AMTrigger is a standard Automate Desktop dataset and can be used much like the datasets created by the Database - SQL query activity and Email action. The fields of AMTrigger can be used within a task to determine specific values, such as whether or not the task was started by a trigger, which trigger started the task, when the trigger was activated and other properties. AMTrigger populates a unique set of field–value pairs for each Automate Desktop trigger. The following table lists the ones specific to this trigger. For more details about a specific AMTrigger field–value pair, click the associated link.
Name | Data Type | Value |
---|---|---|
AMTrigger.TaskLate | Boolean | Indicates to the task whether the schedule trigger launched past it's next launch date/time. This can occur if the computer was turned off or the Automate Desktop Task Service was not running when the task was initially scheduled to run. If the task was late, the value returned is 1. Otherwise, it will be 0. |