Schedule Trigger

Running Processes repeatedly has never been easier.

In order to launch a Process on a schedule, repeatedly every few seconds or once a year, Schedule Trigger will fulfill your needs.

You can learn more about Triggers in general here.

What is Schedule Trigger?

Schedule Trigger relies on time-based scheduling. You can set specific times or intervals to start a Process. This is ideal for tasks that need to be performed regularly, such as daily reports or data backups.

Usage

To use a Trigger in your Process, add it to your Process canvas, and connect it to the beginning of your Process using a Sequence flow. If you are using multiple Triggers in your Process, all Triggers must connect to the same shape, which is also the first non-Trigger shape in your Process.

Once added to your Process, you can change the Trigger's type to match your requirement and give it a unique name. By default, the Trigger's type will provide a corresponding name for the Trigger. You can then configure the parameters for the chosen Trigger type.

For Schedule Trigger, you can specify a time window, when the Process can run, and how often it runs. By default, the Process is triggered once a day at the specified start time, but the schedule can be adjusted to repeat down to every second or so.

If more scarce execution schedule is needed, the schedule can also be set to be daily, weekly, monthly or on specific dates or weekdays only.

Daylight saving time effects

The Process schedules are checked according to the given time zone, which also takes possible daylight saving time (DST) adjustments into account. This means that if you schedule a Process to run every day at 12:00, it will execute at that time, whether DST is in effect or not.

However, because the scheduler uses the adjusted time, the time periods when DST is starting or ending may cause Processes to be scheduled a bit differently than normally.

When the DST is starting, one hour (in EU, the hour from 3 to 4 AM) will be skipped, i.e. the clock will skip from 2:59:59 to 4:00:00. For Processes this means that the schedules cannot be open during this period. The schedule start and end times are adjusted as follows:

• 2:30 - 3:30 --> 2:30 - 2:59:59 - When the end time is invalid, the nearest valid time (right before 3:00:00) is used

• 3:30 - 5:00 --> 4:00 - 5:00 - When the start time is invalid, the nearest valid time (4:00) is used

• 3:30 - 3:45 --> (none) - The schedule will be skipped because it cannot be adjusted to a valid time. You should not use these kinds of schedules.

• 3:30 - 3:30 --> 3:30 - 2:59:59 and 4:00 - 3:30 - Schedules which are open by 24 hours. If the start time is invalid, the start and end times are adjusted so they are valid, and the execution will continue uninterrupted over the DST change.

When the DST is ending, one hour will be added to the day, i.e. the clock will be turned back from 4:00 to 3:00. Therefore the local time will be 3:00 twice for that day. For Processes that start or stop at this ambiguous hour, the ambiguity is resolved by always choosing the first possible occurrence.

DST changes also affect repeating schedules. Because the repeats are calculated from the schedule's local start time, the repeats will start to adhere to the adjusted local time as soon as a new schedule is opened.

If the schedule start time or end time is adjusted due to the DST change, a warning will be logged to the event log for every time the schedule is checked, i.e. every minute. If the schedule would be skipped, i.e. the schedule starts and stops during the invalid period (3:00-3:59:59), an error is logged.

Configuration

To set up a Schedule Trigger, add the shape to Process canvas and connect it as part of your Process. After that, you can select the Trigger type and configure the parameters for it.

The common parameters available for all Triggers are explained on the Trigger reference page. The following configuration parameters are available for Schedule Trigger.

Start time

Specifies the time after which the Process can be triggered. Due to scheduling and technical limitations, the Process might not start right at the start time, but soon after it.

End time

Specifies the time when the executions will end for this Process. If set to same as Start time, the Process is allowed to start at any given time, as long as the scheduling conditions are fulfilled.

If Process execution starts before end time, it is allowed to finish the execution even if it goes past the end time.

Time zone

Specifies the time zone the Schedule Trigger follows. Takes daylight saving into account, so that if the start time is set to 12:00, it will execute at 12:00 whether DST is in effect or not.

Is repeated

Toggle selection to choose whether to repeatedly execute the Process between start and end time. If enabled, additional parameters are displayed to select the frequency.

Is repeated every

Numeric value and selection for seconds, minutes and hours. Defines how often the Process is executed between start and end time, if Is repeated is enabled.

Run only one scheduled instance at a time

Toggle option when enabled, another Process execution will not start if earlier execution is still ongoing. Next Process Instance will start immediately after the earlier execution is finished, as long as end time has not yet been reached. Manually executing the Process or other Triggers are not taken into account for this, and can run simultaneously with a scheduled execution.

Season start date

Date value to choose when the scheduled executions can start. If set to a future date, Process will not be executed by a schedule until that date has been reached, even if the Trigger is activated.

Season end date

Optional date field to select an end date to the scheduled runs. Once this date has been reached, no more scheduled executions will occur with the Trigger, even if the Trigger stays active.

Executed: Daily

Selection field to choose how often the Process is open for execution. Additional parameters are provided for each schedule type.

Is executed every day(s)

Numerical value which when execution is set to Daily, you can fine tune the schedule by selecting every which day the schedule is open, with one corresponding to executing every day, two means every other day and so on.

Executed: Weekly

Selection field to choose how often the Process is open for execution. Additional parameters are provided for each schedule type.

Is executed every week(s)

Numerical value which when execution is set to Weekly, you can fine tune the schedule by selecting every which week the schedule is open, with one corresponding to executing every week, two means every other week and so on.

Chosen days

When execution is set to Weekly, you can choose the weekdays the Process can be executed on. If none are selected, all days are allowed.

Options from Monday to Sunday are available.

Executed: Monthly

Selection field to choose how often the Process is open for execution. Additional parameters are provided for each schedule type.

In months

When execution is set to Monthly, you can choose the months the Process can be executed on. If none are selected, all months are allowed.

Options from January to December are available.

Executed: On chosen days/Based on day order

When execution is set to Monthly, you can choose the method to select which days the Process executions are allowed to start.

With On chosen days, you can select the date numbers to be allowed.

With Based on day order, you can choose which weekdays to run the Process on.

On chosen days: Chosen days

With On chosen days option selected, this multiple select field can be used to select the date numbers the Process is allowed to execute on.

Options 1 to 31 are available.

Based on day order: Ordinal

With Based on day order option selected, this multiple select field can be used to select the ordinal value for a weekday, allowing execution to happen for example every second tuesday of each month.

Options available:

• First

• Second

• Third

• Fourth

• Last

Based on day order: Chosen days

With Based on day order option selected, this multiple selection field allows selecting the weekdays or weekend days that the execution is open, optionally in combination with the ordinal value from above.

Options available:

• Monday - Sunday

• Weekday

• Weekend day

Chosen dates

Selection field to change whether the dates listed below are dates the Process is allowed to execute (Only on these dates), or dates when the Process must not run (Never on these dates).

Also contains a list for possible dates to run or not to run the Process, that you can add dates to.

Importing a list of dates as an ICS calendar file is also possible here.

Do not log trigger parameters

Toggle option that when enabled, hides the Trigger parameters from being logged in Process Instances.

Reference Values

In addition to the default Trigger reference values, Schedule Trigger does not provide additional #trigger reference value fields.