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Cron (Timer) triggers

Run pipelines with a time schedule

Cron triggers allow you to create pipelines that start on a specific time schedule. This is very useful for cleanup jobs or periodic checks or any other workflow that needs to run after a time interval.

All times mentioned in Cron triggers use the UTC time zone.

Manage Cron Triggers with Codefresh UI

It is possible to define and manage Cron-based pipeline triggers with Codefresh UI.

Create a new Cron Trigger

To add a new Cron trigger, navigate to Codefresh Pipeline Configuration view and expand Triggers section. Press the Add Trigger button and select a Cron trigger type to add.

Adding new Trigger dialog

Visit this page to learn about supported cron expression format and aliases.

Fill the following information:

  • Use Cron helper wizard to build a valid cron expression or write custom cron expression on the last tab.
  • Add a free text message, that will be sent as an additional event payload every time cron is executed.

Add Cron Trigger

Trigger Codefresh pipeline with cron timer

Now, cron will trigger a recurrent pipeline execution based on the defined cron expression.

Manage Cron Triggers with Codefresh CLI

It is also possible to use the Codefresh Command Line client (CLI) to manage Cron based pipeline triggers.

Cron trigger

It is possible to trigger a Codefresh CD pipeline(s) periodically, using cron expression.

You can use Codefresh CLI to set up a Codefresh cron trigger.

Create Cron trigger-event

First, you need to create a new cron trigger-event to define a recurrent event.

# create DockerHub recurrent event 'once in 20 minutes'
codefresh create trigger-event --type cron --kind codefresh --value expression="0 */20 * * * *" --value message="hello-once-in-20-min"

# on success trigger-event UID will be printed out
Trigger event: "cron:codefresh:codefresh:0 */20 * * * *:hello-once-in-20-min:107e9db97062" was successfully created.

When creating a cron trigger-event, it is possible to specify a short text message, that will be passed to linked pipelines, every time the specified cron timer is triggered.

Visit this page to learn about the supported cron expression format and aliases.

Set up pipeline trigger

Now, lets create a new pipeline trigger, linking previously defined cron trigger-event to one or more Codefresh pipelines.

# create trigger, linking trigger-event UID to the pipeline UID
codefresh create trigger "cron:codefresh:codefresh:0 */20 * * * *:hello-once-in-20-min:107e9db97062" 7a5622e4b1ad5ba0018a3c9c

# create another trigger, linking the same trigger-event to another pipeline
codefresh create trigger "cron:codefresh:codefresh:0 */20 * * * *:hello-once-in-20-min:107e9db97062" 4a5634e4b2cd6baf021a3c0a

From now on, every 20 minutes Codefresh will trigger a pipeline execution for 2 pipelines linked to the previously specified cron trigger-event (once in 20 minutes)

Cron Event payload

The following variables will be available for any Codefresh pipeline linked to a cron trigger-event:

  • EVENT_MESSAGE - free text message (specified during creation)
  • EVENT_TIMESTAMP - event timestamp in RFC 3339 format

Triggers in pipelines
Creating pipelines