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Agent skill

Cron

by iii-hq in iii-hq/workers

Schedule any registered function on a 6- or 7-field cron expression with the standalone cron worker.

Apache-2.0Auto-check passedProductivity & Automation

Install Cron

skills CLI
$ npx skills add iii-hq/workers --skill cron -a claude-code

Project install by default; add -g for ~/.claude/skills/.

GitHub CLI
$ gh skill install iii-hq/workers cron --agent claude-code

Project scope by default; add --scope user for a personal install. Needs GitHub CLI 2.90.0 or later (public preview).

Manual copy
$ git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/iii-hq/workers.git skills-src && mkdir -p .claude/skills && cp -r skills-src/cron/skills .claude/skills/cron && rm -rf skills-src

Use ~/.claude/skills/ instead of .claude/skills for a personal install. The folder must contain SKILL.md.

Claude Code skills documentation · loads skills from .claude/skills/

Facts

Skill name
cron
GitHub stars
113
Token cost
~1.2k tokens
SKILL.md length
625 words
Files
1
Skills in repo
19
Repo updated
First seen
Licence
Apache-2.0

At a glance

Schedule any registered function on a 6- or 7-field cron expression with the standalone cron worker.

  • Works in 2 steps: Register a handler:… → Register the trigger
  • Tasks that involve Scheduled and recurring tasks
  • SKILL.md covers When to Use, Boundaries and Reactive triggers
  • Instructions only: no scripts, shell commands, URLs or credentials in SKILL.md

What it does

Cron is an agent skill from iii-hq/workers. Schedule any registered function on a 6- or 7-field cron expression with the standalone cron worker. Its whole surface is the cron trigger type.

Its SKILL.md is about 1.2k tokens, which your agent loads only when the skill is triggered. It is a single SKILL.md file with no bundled scripts.

It sits in Productivity & Automation, covering Scheduled and recurring tasks. The licence is Apache-2.0.

When your agent uses it

  • Tasks that involve Scheduled and recurring tasks

Example prompts

  • “/cron”

Workflow steps

2 steps, taken from the first numbered list in SKILL.md.

  1. Register a handler: iii.registerFunction('jobs::cleanup-old-data', handler).
  2. Register the trigger

What it can do on your machine

Read from SKILL.md and the folder at commit 1ff0459. It shows what the files ask for, not the result of running them.

  • Tool permissions

    Pre-approves nothing: there is no allowed-tools line, so your agent's usual permission prompts apply.

    From allowed-tools in the SKILL.md frontmatter.

  • Runs code

    No scripts in the folder and no shell commands in SKILL.md (its code samples are typescript, json and yaml).

    From the folder's file list and the shell code blocks in SKILL.md.

  • Network

    No URLs in SKILL.md.

    From URLs in SKILL.md, links to its own repository left out.

  • Credentials

    Names no API keys, tokens, secrets or passwords.

    From names ending in _API_KEY, _TOKEN, _SECRET, _KEY or _PASSWORD in SKILL.md.

Context cost

Cron loads about 1.2k tokens when it runs. Until then it costs about 38 tokens; SKILL.md has 625 words of instructions outside code blocks.

Always · name and description, kept in context so the agent knows when to use it
~38
When it runs · the whole SKILL.md, loaded when a task matches
~1.2k

Estimates: characters ÷ 4, the usual rule of thumb; real counts depend on the model's tokenizer. Scripts and assets cost tokens only if the agent reads them.

Safety

Auto-check passed

The automated check found no risky patterns in SKILL.md.

Automated static check — not a guarantee. Review scripts before installing. It scans the text of SKILL.md for risky patterns (piping downloads into a shell, reading credential files, hidden Unicode, destructive commands); files beside SKILL.md are not scanned.

SKILL.md

The full file from iii-hq/workers at commit 1ff0459, republished under its Apache-2.0 licence (© iii-hq). 625 words, ~1,243 tokens.

Download SKILL.mdSave it as .claude/skills/cron/SKILL.md (or your agent's skills folder).
name
cron
description
Schedule any registered function on a 6- or 7-field cron expression with the standalone cron worker. Its whole surface is the `cron` trigger type.
tags
cron, scheduling, triggers, jobs

cron

The cron worker schedules registered functions to run on recurring cron expressions. It exposes no callable cron::* functions; its entire surface is the cron trigger type, bound through a worker SDK trigger registration such as iii.registerTrigger({ type: 'cron', function_id, config }).

Install it with iii trigger compose::add worker=cron. The legacy in-engine cron service must not run on the same engine because it also owns the cron trigger type. Remove the legacy built-in from the engine config before starting this worker; the standalone worker refuses to boot when the builtin is active.

On every firing, the worker optionally evaluates a condition function, acquires a lock through the configured backend, and invokes the target function with an event payload containing trigger, job_id, scheduled_time, and actual_time. scheduled_time and actual_time let handlers observe drift without querying the scheduler.

The schedule grammar is the Rust cron crate dialect: six or seven fields, second minute hour day-of-month month day-of-week [year]. The year field is optional. The leading field is always seconds, so 0 */5 * * * * fires every 5 minutes at second 0, while */5 * * * * * fires every 5 seconds.

Write the day of week as a name: Mon, Tue, Wed, Thu, Fri, Sat, Sun. Numerically this dialect counts Sunday as 1, one ahead of the Unix convention, so 0 0 9 * * 1 fires on Sunday and a 1 written for Monday fires a day early. Names avoid the whole question.

Two lock backends govern duplicate firing. local is the default and is only process-local; every worker instance can fire the same job in a multi-instance deployment. redis uses Redis locking and is required for once-only firing across a fleet. The lock TTL is 30 seconds.

When to Use

  • A function should run periodically without a separate scheduler process or system crontab entry.
  • You need recurring cleanup, reporting, maintenance, or batch jobs that should fire on UTC cron windows.
  • You need once-only firing across a fleet and can configure the redis lock backend.
  • A scheduled job should be conditionally skipped by setting condition_function_id, without putting the condition inside the handler.
Show full SKILL.md (284 more words)Show less

Boundaries

  • No callable functions are exposed. Never invoke cron::*; bind the cron trigger type to one of your own functions.
  • The default local backend is process-local. Do not rely on it for once-only jobs in a multi-instance deployment.
  • The worker does not catch up missed runs after downtime. It schedules the next upcoming UTC fire from the time it is running.
  • A condition function only blocks when it returns explicit JSON false. Truthy, null, or missing results allow the fire; condition errors skip that fire.
  • Five-field crontab expressions are not the intended format. Include the seconds field.
  • For data-change or stream-change reactions, use the relevant state, stream, queue, or event worker instead; cron fires on the clock only.

Reactive triggers

Bind a cron trigger when a handler should run on a recurring schedule. The handler runs through the engine as a normal function invocation. With the redis backend, only one worker instance should own a scheduled fire across the fleet.

Reach for it when:

  • You need recurring execution such as cleanup, reports, or maintenance.
  • You want condition-gated firing: set condition_function_id and the worker evaluates it before each run.
  • One function should be driven by multiple schedules; register multiple triggers and branch on the job_id payload field.
How to bind
  1. Register a handler: iii.registerFunction('jobs::cleanup-old-data', handler).
  2. Register the trigger:
typescript
iii.registerTrigger({
  type: 'cron',
  function_id: 'jobs::cleanup-old-data',
  config: {
    expression: '0 0 2 * * * *',  // sec min hour dom month dow [year]; daily at 02:00:00 UTC.
    // condition_function_id is optional.
  },
})

expression is required and must parse. Bind one function_id to several triggers with distinct trigger ids to drive multiple schedules into one handler; the trigger id arrives as job_id in the event. The handler's return value is ignored.

Event payload:

json
{
  "trigger": "cron",
  "job_id": "<trigger-id>",
  "scheduled_time": "2026-07-03T12:00:00+00:00",
  "actual_time": "2026-07-03T12:00:00.123456789+00:00"
}

Configure the lock backend through the central configuration entry for worker cron:

yaml
adapter:
  name: redis
  config:
    redis_url: redis://localhost:6379

Use adapter.name: local for single-process development and adapter.name: redis for multi-instance once-only scheduling.

© iii-hq, Apache-2.0. Rendered from Markdown: HTML in the file is shown as text, images as links, and headings moved down two levels. Raw file

Files

Just SKILL.md in cron/skills of iii-hq/workers.

Open the folder on GitHubat commit 1ff0459

Compare with similar skills

Cron next to the 5 skills that share the most tags, products or categories with it. Stars are the repository's; “used in” counts other GitHub owners with a copy.

Cron compared with similar skills
SkillStarsUsed inTokensAuto-checkLicenceRepo updated
Cron this skilliii-hq/workers113—~1.2kAutomated safety check: PassApache-2.0
ScheduleTinyAGI/tinyagi3.6k—~1.4kAutomated safety check: PassMIT
Send User MessageTinyAGI/tinyagi3.6k—~829Automated safety check: PassMIT
Cron Opsczl9707/build-your-own-openclaw1.9k—~593Automated safety check: PassMIT
X Bookmarkssharbelxyz/x-bookmarks289—~2kAutomated safety check: NotesNone
Wp Wpcli And OpsAutomattic/agent-skills2112 repos~988Automated safety check: PassNone

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Categories

Questions about Cron

What does Cron do?

Schedule any registered function on a 6- or 7-field cron expression with the standalone cron worker. Cron is an agent skill from iii-hq/workers. Schedule any registered function on a 6- or 7-field cron expression with the standalone cron worker.

When should I use Cron?

Cron fits situations like: tasks that involve Scheduled and recurring tasks.

How do I install Cron in Claude Code?

Run `npx skills add iii-hq/workers --skill cron -a claude-code`. Or copy the skill folder (cron/skills in iii-hq/workers) into .claude/skills/cron in your project. Claude Code loads it when a task matches its description.

How do I install Cron in Codex?

Run `npx skills add iii-hq/workers --skill cron -a codex`. Or copy the skill folder (cron/skills in iii-hq/workers) into .agents/skills/cron in your project. Codex loads it when a task matches its description.

Can I use Cron in Cursor, Gemini CLI or GitHub Copilot?

Cursor, Gemini CLI, GitHub Copilot and OpenCode also load SKILL.md folders. With the skills CLI, run `npx skills add iii-hq/workers --skill cron -a cursor` (or -a gemini-cli, github-copilot or opencode for the others). To copy it by hand, put the folder in .cursor/skills/cron, .gemini/skills/cron, .github/skills/cron and .opencode/skills/cron in your project.

What does Cron need to run?

SKILL.md names no scripts, command-line tools or credentials: Cron is instructions for the agent only.

Does Cron access the network?

SKILL.md contains no URLs. Any network use would come from the scripts or tools the agent runs. This is read from the text; nothing was executed.

Is Cron safe to install?

Our automated static check of SKILL.md found no risky patterns, such as piping downloads into a shell, reading credential files or hidden Unicode. It is not a guarantee. Review the folder before installing.

What licence does Cron use?

Cron is published under the Apache-2.0 licence (the repository's licence). It allows redistribution, so the full SKILL.md is shown on this page.

How many tokens does Cron use?

About 1.2k tokens (SKILL.md is roughly 5k characters). Agents keep only the skill's name and description in context until a task matches; then they load SKILL.md in full.

What are the alternatives to Cron?

Skills that share tags, products or a category with Cron: Schedule (TinyAGI/tinyagi, 3.6k stars), Send User Message (TinyAGI/tinyagi, 3.6k stars), Cron Ops (czl9707/build-your-own-openclaw, 1.9k stars) and X Bookmarks (sharbelxyz/x-bookmarks, 289 stars). The comparison table on this page puts their stars, adoption, token cost, safety result and licence side by side.

Who maintains Cron?

iii-hq (a GitHub organization) maintains it in iii-hq/workers, which has 113 GitHub stars. The repository holds 19 skills in this directory. The repository was last updated on October 9, 2026.

Source: iii-hq/workers on GitHub. Facts on this page come from the repository at the commit we read; the author's words are quoted as theirs.