Job Execution Monitor

Monitor scheduled cron jobs hourly, alerting you only if jobs fail or miss their expected run time with tracked alert state to avoid spam.

Monitor scheduled jobs (cron) and alert when they fail or miss their schedule.

Install / Update (ClawHub)

Install:

clawhub install job-execution-monitor

Update:

clawhub update job-execution-monitor

---

When to Use

Use when the user asks to:

• "monitor cron jobs"
• "alert on job failures"
• "check if jobs ran"
• "job healthcheck"
• "task surveillance"
• "why didn't my scheduled job run?"

What It Does

Heartbeat-based monitoring:

• Agent checks jobs during periodic heartbeat polls (~every 60min)
• Uses cheapest LLM (Gemini Flash or Haiku) to minimize cost
• Only sends alerts when problems detected
• Tracks alert state to avoid spam

Cost: ~100k tokens/day (~48 checks × 2k tokens)

How It Works

1. Configuration: Jobs to monitor are listed in job-execution-monitor.json
2. Heartbeat check: Agent wakes every 15-30min, checks jobs every ~4th wake
3. Detection: Compares last run time vs. expected schedule + tolerance
4. Alert: Wake event with context (expected schedule vs last run) → you decide next action
5. Recovery: Clears alert when job runs successfully again

Disable / Uninstall

If installed via systemd user timer

systemctl --user stop openclaw-job-execution-monitor.timer
systemctl --user disable openclaw-job-execution-monitor.timer
systemctl --user daemon-reload

# Optional: remove unit files
rm -f ~/.config/systemd/user/openclaw-job-execution-monitor.service \
      ~/.config/systemd/user/openclaw-job-execution-monitor.timer

If installed via cron

crontab -l | sed '/job-execution-monitor\/scripts\/healthcheck\.sh/d' | crontab -

Optional cleanup (config/state/log)

rm -f ~/.openclaw/workspace/job-execution-monitor.json
rm -f ~/.openclaw/workspace/.job-execution-monitor-state.json
rm -f ~/.openclaw/workspace/job-execution-monitor.log

---

Configuration

File: ~/.openclaw/workspace/job-execution-monitor.json

{
  "checkIntervalMin": 60,
  "jobs": {
    "Daily 21:00 journaling (projects + accomplishments + next day plan)": {
      "schedule": "0 22 * * *",
      "tolerance": 600,
      "critical": true,
      "expectedMinLength": 200,
      "errorPatterns": ["error", "failed", "Pong", "token overflow"]
    }
  }
}

Fields:

• schedule: cron expression for expected run time
• tolerance: grace period in seconds (default 600 = 10min)
• critical: if true, alerts immediately (future: could escalate)
• expectedMinLength: minimum response length (phase 2)
• errorPatterns: text patterns that indicate failure (phase 2)

State Tracking

File: ~/.openclaw/workspace/.job-execution-monitor-state.json

{
  "lastCheck": 1771025000,
  "alerts": {
    "daily-wrap-up_missed": 1771024500
  }
}

• lastCheck: unix timestamp of last check
• alerts: map of alert_key → timestamp (prevents spam)

Instructions (for Agent)

In HEARTBEAT.md:

## Job Execution Monitor (every ~60min, rotate)

Check cron jobs for missed schedules. Only alert if problem found.

**Instructions:**
1. Load `job-execution-monitor.json` config
2. Call `cron list` 
3. For each job in config:
   - Extract `state.lastRunAtMs` and `state.lastStatus`
   - Parse schedule (e.g., "0 22 * * *" = 22:00 daily)
   - If last run > (expected time + tolerance): **ALERT**
   - If last run recent: **SILENT**
4. On alert: send wake event with job name, expected time, last run time
5. On recovery (was alerting before, now OK): send recovery wake event

**State tracking:** `~/.openclaw/workspace/.job-execution-monitor-state.json`
- Track which jobs already alerted (don't spam)
- Clear alert flag when job recovers

**Rotate check:** Only run every ~4th heartbeat (once/hour if heartbeat is 15min)

Examples

Scenario 1: Job missed

🔴 Job Execution Monitor: "daily-wrap-up" missed schedule
Expected: 22:00 ±10min
Last run: 5h 32m ago
Checking logs...

Scenario 2: Job recovered

✅ Job Execution Monitor: "daily-wrap-up" recovered
Last run: 22:02 (2min ago)

Scenario 3: All OK

(silent - no wake event, no alert)

Cost Analysis

Per check (~2k tokens):

• Load config: ~200 tokens
• Call cron list: ~500 tokens
• Parse + compare: ~500 tokens
• Decision + response: ~800 tokens

Daily (~48 checks):

• 48 × 2k = ~100k tokens/day
• Using Gemini Flash: ~$0.01/day ✅

Compared to alternatives:

• Bash script every 10min: 0 tokens, but complex + fragile
• Cron job every 10min: 144 × 2k = ~300k tokens/day
• Heartbeat every 60min: ~100k tokens/day ← chosen ✅

Files

• SKILL.md - This documentation
• README.md - Quick start
• config/job-execution-monitor.example.json - Config template
• scripts/patterns.json - Error patterns (phase 2)
• ~/workspace/job-execution-monitor.json - User config
• ~/workspace/.job-execution-monitor-state.json - Alert state

Philosophy

Smart monitoring, minimal cost.

• Check frequency: ~1/hour (good enough for daily jobs)
• Use cheapest LLM: Gemini Flash or Haiku
• Only wake main session when real problems occur
• State tracking prevents alert spam
• Agent-based = leverages existing tools, no auth/API hassles

---

Phase 1 complete. ✅
Phase 2 (pattern matching): Coming soon.
Phase 3 (structured validation): Future.