Schedules

This section is available for users with the following roles: Administrator, Viewer, Project Administrator, Developer, and VCS Service User.

Use the Schedules menu to manage schedules in Management Console. A schedule denotes a selection of robots and plans (jobs) for running them. Running the schedule means running the selected robots (in parallel or sequence), optionally executing pre- and post-run robots.

When selecting an interval between consecutively run schedules, be aware that if the next scheduled run occurs when the previous one is running, the next scheduled run does not start.

At the top of the Schedules menu, in the Projects drop-down list, select the project with schedules to display. You can change the way the information for each schedule is presented as follows:

Filter the list of schedules in the table by typing a name or a part of a name in the Filter text field. See Filtering for more information.
Select the table columns to display for a schedule using the menu icon on the right.
Refresh the displayed information by clicking the refresh icon on the right.
Reset the custom column settings by clicking the reset icon on the right.
Select the number of items to display per page and navigate among pages by using the navigation menu in the bottom right corner.

By default, the following table columns are displayed for each schedule.

Column	Description
Active	When active, the schedule runs as planned. You may need to make a schedule inactive for several reasons, such as: The function performed by the schedule currently is not needed. Errors are found in the robots and you want to fix the errors before the next run. You want to trigger the schedule manually each time it should run. This may be appropriate for some robots and schedules, such as for preparation or cleanup tasks.
Start / Stop	Starts or stops a schedule when you click the icon or . The icon changes based on the status of the schedule (running or stopped). If multiple schedules are activated, the Start / Stop icon shows the status of each selected schedule.
Name	Name of the schedule.
Project name	Name of the project that the schedule belongs to (useful when viewing all projects).
Job count	Combination of total and active jobs. If all jobs are active, it lists the number of active jobs. If two of three jobs are active, it lists 2 (3).
Next run	Time when the schedule is planned to run next time.
Previous run	Time when the schedule was last run.
Interval	Planned interval between two consecutive runs of the same schedule.
Total runs	How many times the schedule has been run.
Errors	Number of schedule errors during the last run of the schedule. Schedule errors do not include robot errors. To see errors and robot errors, make sure that the log database is set up by using the General tab in Settings->RoboServer log database and that database logging is enabled on the RoboServers in RoboServers->Settings->Logging.
Robot errors	Number of robot errors that occurred in robots run by this schedule. When the RoboServer works with a scheduled robot, and the robot reports an error, the scheduler and RoboServer are not stopped while the RoboServer tries to recover from the error.
Optional Columns
Total jobs	Total number of jobs in the schedule.
Active jobs	Number of active jobs in the schedule.
Created by	Name of the user who created the schedule.
Modified by	Name of the user who last modified the schedule.
Commit message	Summary describing the commit.
Revision number	Number of the schedule revision.
Cluster	Cluster that the schedule executes on.
Priority	Execution priority for this job over other jobs in a schedule.

Create a new schedule

To create a new schedule, click the plus sign in the upper left corner.
The "Select project" dialog box appears.
Select a project and click OK.

Several new tabs open.
The Basic tab contains everything necessary for setting up a schedule.
- Name: Name of the schedule.
- Active: Select this option to make this schedule active.
- Simple / Cron: Select a way of defining the time plan for a schedule.
- Every: Available only for simple schedules. Desired time interval between two consecutive runs of the schedule. It is entered as an integral number with a unit, such as "1 minute" or "3 hours."
- Pattern: Available only for cron schedules. Pattern defining when the schedule should be run.
- Server time zone: Available only for cron schedules. By default, the server time zone is used for running schedules. With this option, you can also select a particular UTC time zone.
- Start time: Local time when the schedule must start.
- Choose a date: Date when the schedule must start.
- Jobs priority: Execution priority for this job over other jobs queuing for the same required resources. The priority applies to all robot jobs in a schedule. For more information, see Set job priorities.
- Jobs timeout: Timeout for the how long a job remains in the queue. If a job cannot be allocated resources and executed by the time the timeout is reached, the job exits the queue. The timeout applies to all robot jobs in a schedule. For more information, see Set job priorities.
- Pre-processing robot: Name of a robot that is run before the schedule is started.
- Post-processing robot: Name of a robot that is run after all other robots in the schedule are run.
- Run on cluster: Name of the cluster to run this schedule.
- Commit message: Summary describing the commit.
On the Advanced tab, you can configure runtime constraints.
- Execution time limit: Set the maximum execution time for each robot in the schedule. When a robot has executed for this period of time, the server stops it, and an error is logged. The default value is -1, which means the time is not limited.
- Extracted values limit: Select the maximum number of values each robot may output. If the robot produces more than this number of values, the server stops it, and an error is logged. The default value is -1, which means the number is not limited.
  
  Limits apply to each robot run individually, not the schedule as a whole. If a robot reaches the limit, it stops, while the schedule continues.
- Use email notification: Check to receive an email whenever a robot fails. If several robots in a schedule fail, you will get one email for each robot each time the schedule runs. Email notification works only if you configure an SMTP server and enter the desired email addresses in the Email addresses field.
- Email addresses: Comma-separated list of email addresses to which notifications are sent. The first listed address is used as both a sender and receiver address. The field can contain up to 255 characters. If you exceed the number of characters in this field, the schedule is not saved.

On the Jobs in schedule tab, you see the list of jobs that will run when the schedule is triggered.

Run jobs sequentially: Select to execute robots in the order listed on the Jobs in schedule tab.
Job name: Display name of the job. This is the name specified in the display name attribute when uploading the robot.
Active: When Active, the job runs when the schedule is run. You may want to make a single job within a schedule inactive for several reasons, such as:
- Because the function performed by the job is currently not needed.
- Because errors have been found in the robots and you do not want the schedule to run before you have fixed these errors.
- Because you want to trigger the job manually each time it should run.

Add jobs to schedule

To add jobs to a schedule, do the following.

Click the plus sign in the upper left corner.

A dialog box appears to guide you through the job creation.
In the Select job type step, select an option. Available options include:
- A single robot
- A group of robots based on name

Job Type	Description
Single robot	Adds a job that runs a single robot. You can add several robots one by one. To pass input to a robot, you can specify the necessary parameters.
Group of robots	Adds a job that runs any number of robots which path name matches a given criteria. The robot groups are evaluated every time the schedule starts; therefore, new robots matching the selected criteria run automatically.

Actions on schedules

Click the context menu of a robot to choose from the following actions.

Create copy: Opens the wizard for schedule creation. Specify a new name, make any changes to the schedule, and click OK.
Edit: Opens the same wizard as for schedule creation with filled parameters.
View: Multiple view functions are available to see information related to schedule runs as also appears in the Log view.

In the Schedules page, perform the following actions.

Select a schedule or multiple schedules and click the Activate & Deactivate icon to turn on/turn off the schedules.
Select a schedule or multiple schedules and click the Run & Stop icon to manually run or stop the schedules. When you stop a schedule, all of its running robots are stopped as quickly as possible. The schedule is displayed as "running" until all of its robots stop executing.
If you attempt to run schedules that are already running, an error appears containing the running schedule names.
Select a schedule or multiple schedules and click the Delete schedules icon to delete the schedules.
Select a schedule and click the applicable Start / Stop icon or to manually start or stop the schedule.

Alternative schedule creation

It is also possible to create a schedule from the Robots section. To do so, click the context menu for the required robot and select Create schedule.