Scheduling

Scheduling allows your playbooks to run automatically at specified times or intervals without manual intervention. Set up daily reports, hourly monitors, or event-triggered workflows that run reliably in the background.

Quick Setup: Tell Nira “Run this every morning at 9am” and she’ll configure the schedule automatically. Press ⌘K to get started.

Schedule Types

NimbleBrain Studio supports three types of scheduling:

Time-Based

Run at specific times (daily at 9am, weekdays at 8am)

Interval-Based

Run at regular intervals (every 15 minutes, hourly)

Event-Triggered

Run when webhooks receive data

Time-Based Scheduling

Run playbooks at specific times on specific days.

Examples
Configuration

Daily at 9:00 AM - Morning reports
Weekdays at 8:00 AM and 5:00 PM - Start and end of day summaries
Every Monday at 10:00 AM - Weekly reports
First day of month at 9:00 AM - Monthly summaries
Last Friday of month at 4:00 PM - End of month reviews

{
  "schedule": {
    "type": "time",
    "time": "09:00",
    "days": ["monday", "tuesday", "wednesday", "thursday", "friday"],
    "timezone": "America/New_York"
  }
}

Setting Up with Nira

Just describe when you want your playbook to run:

You: “Create a sales report that runs every weekday at 8am Eastern time”Nira: “I’ll create a playbook that queries your CRM data and sends a summary. It will run Monday through Friday at 8:00 AM Eastern. Would you like me to set that up?”

Interval-Based Scheduling

Run playbooks at regular intervals throughout the day.

Examples
Configuration

Every 15 minutes - Real-time monitoring
Every hour - Hourly status checks
Every 6 hours - Periodic data sync
Every 24 hours - Daily batch processing

{
  "schedule": {
    "type": "interval",
    "interval": "1h",  // Options: 15m, 30m, 1h, 6h, 24h
    "startTime": "08:00"
  }
}

Interval values: 15m (15 min), 30m (30 min), 1h (hourly), 6h (6 hours), 24h (daily)

Setting Up with Nira

You: “Monitor our API endpoints every 15 minutes and alert me if response time exceeds 2 seconds”Nira: “I’ll create a monitoring playbook that checks your endpoints every 15 minutes. If any endpoint takes longer than 2 seconds to respond, I’ll send you an alert via Slack. Sound good?”

Event-Triggered Scheduling

Run playbooks when external events occur via webhooks.

Examples
Configuration

New customer signup - Welcome email workflow
Support ticket created - Triage and routing
Payment received - Invoice processing
File uploaded - Document processing

{
  "schedule": {
    "type": "trigger",
    "trigger": "webhook",
    "endpoint": "/webhooks/playbook-abc123"
  }
}

Setting Up with Nira

You: “When a new customer signs up in Stripe, send them a welcome email and create a ticket in Zendesk”Nira: “I’ll set up a webhook that triggers when Stripe detects a new subscription. The playbook will send a personalized welcome email and create a customer success ticket. I’ll provide you with the webhook URL to configure in Stripe.”

Managing Schedules

Viewing Scheduled Playbooks

All scheduled playbooks appear in your Playbooks list with a clock icon. You can see:

Next run time - When the playbook will execute next
Last run time - When it last executed
Status - Active, paused, or failed

Pausing & Resuming

Temporarily disable a schedule without deleting the playbook:

Pause

Stop scheduled runs temporarily (e.g., during maintenance or holidays)

Resume

Restart scheduled runs when ready

To pause or resume, either:

Click the pause/play button in the Playbooks list
Tell Nira: “Pause my morning report playbook”

Modifying Schedules

Update a schedule anytime:

You: “Change my sales report to run at 7am instead of 8am”Nira: “Done! Your sales report playbook will now run at 7:00 AM Eastern on weekdays.”

Timezone Handling

All schedules run in the timezone you specify. If no timezone is set, your workspace’s default timezone is used.

Tip: When creating playbooks with Nira, include the timezone in your request: “Run this at 9am Pacific” or “8am Eastern time”

Supported timezone formats:

America/New_York
America/Los_Angeles
Europe/London
Asia/Tokyo
And all standard IANA timezone names

Error Handling

When a scheduled playbook fails:

Automatic Retry - Failed runs retry up to 3 times with exponential backoff
Error Notification - You’re notified via your configured channels
Execution Log - Full details available in Activity Logs
Schedule Continues - Future scheduled runs are not affected

Configuring Retries

{
  "errorHandling": {
    "retry": true,
    "maxRetries": 3,
    "retryDelay": "5m",
    "onError": "continue"
  }
}

Options:

continue - Keep running future scheduled executions
pause - Pause the schedule after repeated failures
notify - Send additional alerts on failure

Best Practices

Choose the Right Schedule Type

Time-based for reports, summaries, and scheduled communications
Interval-based for monitoring, syncing, and polling
Event-triggered for real-time responses to external actions

Consider Timezone Impact

If your playbook affects users in multiple timezones, consider:

Running at a time that works across regions
Creating separate playbooks for different regions
Using UTC for internal processes

Avoid Peak Times

For non-urgent playbooks, avoid running during peak hours:

Spread out batch processing throughout the day
Run heavy reports during off-hours
Stagger similar playbooks to avoid conflicts

Test Before Scheduling

Always run a playbook manually first:

Verify it produces expected output
Check that notifications reach the right destinations
Confirm API connections are working
Then enable the schedule

Monitor Initially

For new scheduled playbooks:

Watch the first few runs closely
Check Activity Logs for any issues
Adjust timing or configuration as needed

Common Patterns

Morning Briefing

Schedule: Weekdays at 7:00 AMPlaybook: Fetch weather, calendar events, and top news headlines. Compile into a summary and send to Slack.Tell Nira: “Create a morning briefing that sends me weather, my calendar, and top tech news every weekday at 7am”

Hourly System Health Check

Schedule: Every hourPlaybook: Check API endpoints, database performance, and error logs. Alert if issues detected.Tell Nira: “Monitor our production API every hour and alert #engineering if response times exceed 1 second”

Weekly Report

Schedule: Every Monday at 9:00 AMPlaybook: Aggregate last week’s metrics from CRM, support tickets, and usage data. Generate PDF report and email to leadership.Tell Nira: “Create a weekly report every Monday that summarizes our sales pipeline and support metrics from HubSpot and Zendesk”

Real-Time Customer Onboarding

Schedule: Webhook trigger from StripePlaybook: When new subscription is created, send welcome email, create CRM record, and notify success team.Tell Nira: “When a new customer signs up in Stripe, send them a welcome email and add them to HubSpot”

Troubleshooting

Playbook didn't run on schedule

Check:

Playbook is not paused
Schedule timezone is correct
Look for errors in Activity Logs
Verify API credentials haven’t expired

Playbook runs at wrong time

Solution:

Verify timezone setting
Check if daylight saving time affected the schedule
Update the schedule with explicit timezone

Too many executions

Solution:

Review interval settings (15m vs 1h)
Add conditions to skip unnecessary runs
Consider time-based instead of interval scheduling

Missed runs during outage

Note:

NimbleBrain does not backfill missed runs
Schedule resumes normally after service restoration
Check Activity Logs for execution history

Playbooks

Learn about creating playbooks

Activity Logs

Monitor execution history

Nira

Set up schedules conversationally

Connections

Browse available integrations

Getting Started

Building Automations

Connections

Workspace & Settings

Scheduling

Scheduling

Schedule Types

Time-Based

Interval-Based

Event-Triggered

Time-Based Scheduling

Setting Up with Nira

Interval-Based Scheduling

Setting Up with Nira

Event-Triggered Scheduling

Setting Up with Nira

Managing Schedules

Viewing Scheduled Playbooks

Pausing & Resuming

Pause

Resume

Modifying Schedules

Timezone Handling

Error Handling

Configuring Retries

Best Practices

Common Patterns

Morning Briefing

Hourly System Health Check

Weekly Report

Real-Time Customer Onboarding

Troubleshooting

Playbooks

Activity Logs

Nira

Connections

Getting Started

Building Automations

Connections

Workspace & Settings

​Scheduling

​Schedule Types

Time-Based

Interval-Based

Event-Triggered

​Time-Based Scheduling

​Setting Up with Nira

​Interval-Based Scheduling

​Setting Up with Nira

​Event-Triggered Scheduling

​Setting Up with Nira

​Managing Schedules

​Viewing Scheduled Playbooks

​Pausing & Resuming

Pause

Resume

​Modifying Schedules

​Timezone Handling

​Error Handling

​Configuring Retries

​Best Practices

​Common Patterns

​Morning Briefing

​Hourly System Health Check

​Weekly Report

​Real-Time Customer Onboarding

​Troubleshooting

​Related

Playbooks

Activity Logs

Nira

Connections

Scheduling

Schedule Types

Time-Based Scheduling

Setting Up with Nira

Interval-Based Scheduling

Setting Up with Nira

Event-Triggered Scheduling

Setting Up with Nira

Managing Schedules

Viewing Scheduled Playbooks

Pausing & Resuming

Modifying Schedules

Timezone Handling

Error Handling

Configuring Retries

Best Practices

Common Patterns

Morning Briefing

Hourly System Health Check

Weekly Report

Real-Time Customer Onboarding

Troubleshooting

Related