Run services on a schedule
Run services on an interval, at a specific time or on a cron expression.
The scheduler invokes your services on an interval, at a specific time or on a cron expression. Jobs are created in the Dashboard or from Python and no service code changes are needed for a service to become a scheduled one.
For a step-by-step introduction, see the Python scheduler tutorial.
Invoke services on an interval
To create a job, go to Scheduler > Config in the Dashboard, click Create a new job and fill in the form:
- Name: Nightly Sync
- Service: the service the scheduler invokes on each run
- Every: how often to run it, e.g. every 30 minutes
- Click OK
The service is invoked each time the job fires, and any extra data provided in the job's definition is available to the service in self.request.raw_request:
# -*- coding: utf-8 -*-
# Zato
from zato.server.service import Service
class MyService(Service):
def handle(self):
self.logger.info('Message received: %s', self.request.raw_request)
Schedule one-time jobs in Python
To run a service once, at a specific time, call self.schedule.onetime. The example below schedules another service for a specific moment - the prefix parameter makes the job easy to find in the Dashboard and logs:
# -*- coding: utf-8 -*-
# Zato
from zato.server.service import Service
class MyTarget(Service):
def handle(self):
self.logger.warn('I was invoked with %s', self.request.input)
class Scheduler(Service):
def handle(self):
# This can be used to make it easier to understand which scheduled job is which
prefix = 'user@example.com'
# This is what the target service is going to receive on input
data = {
'my.key': 'my.value'
}
# This is when the job should start, note that the time must be in UTC
start_date = '2027-07-29 11:35:49'
# This is the call that schedules the job
self.schedule.onetime(self, MyTarget, prefix=prefix, start_date=start_date, data=data)
Schedule interval-based and cron-style jobs in Python
To create interval-based or cron-style jobs from code, invoke the built-in zato.scheduler.job.create service:
# stdlib
from datetime import datetime
# Zato
from zato.server.service import Service
class MyService(Service):
def handle(self):
#
# We schedule a cron-style job here that will run once per hour (@hourly)
#
request = {
'name': 'my-job-1',
'is_active': True,
'service': 'zato.ping',
'job_type': 'cron_style',
'start_date': datetime.utcnow().isoformat(), # Always in UTC
'cron_definition': '@hourly'
}
self.invoke('zato.scheduler.job.create', request)
See also
| Feature | What it does |
|---|---|
| IMAP | Poll mailboxes on a schedule with an auto-created job |
| Config files | Keep a job's settings outside code |
| SMTP | Send email from scheduled services |