---
title: Scheduled Operations
description: Automate recurring Docker operations like stack restarts, fleet snapshots, and system prunes on a cron schedule.
---

<Note>
  Scheduled Operations requires a Sencho **Admiral** license.
  Skipper and Community Edition do not include this feature.
</Note>

## Overview

Scheduled Operations lets you automate recurring maintenance tasks across your infrastructure. Define a cron schedule, choose an action, and Sencho handles the rest, including a full execution history log so you always know what ran and when.

<Frame>
  <img src="/images/scheduled-operations/overview.png" alt="Scheduled operations list view showing tasks with status, schedule, and actions" />
</Frame>

## Supported Actions

| Action | Target | Description |
|--------|--------|-------------|
| **Restart Stack** | A specific stack (or specific services within it) on a specific node | Restarts all or selected containers in the stack |
| **Fleet Snapshot** | All nodes | Creates a fleet-wide backup of all compose files and `.env` files |
| **System Prune** | The default node | Prunes selected resources, optionally filtered by Docker label |
| **Vulnerability Scan** | All images on a specific node | Runs Trivy against every image on the target node and records the results. Requires Trivy to be installed — see [Installing Trivy](/operations/trivy-setup). Available on Skipper and Admiral. |

## Creating a Scheduled Task

1. Navigate to the **Schedules** tab in the top navigation bar (visible to Admiral admins).
2. Click **New Schedule**.
3. Fill in the form:
   - **Name**: A descriptive label (e.g. "Nightly staging restart").
   - **Action**: Choose Restart Stack, Fleet Snapshot, System Prune, or Vulnerability Scan. The form fields below change based on your selection.
   - **Node**: (Restart Stack and Vulnerability Scan) Select the node to run against. For Restart Stack it determines where the target stack lives; for Vulnerability Scan it determines which node's images are scanned.
   - **Stack**: (Restart Stack only) Select the stack to restart. Becomes available after choosing a node.
   - **Services**: (Restart Stack only) Optionally select specific services within the stack to restart. Leave empty to restart all services.
   - **Prune Targets**: (System Prune only) Select which resources to prune: containers, images, networks, volumes. All are selected by default.
   - **Label Filter**: (System Prune only) Optionally filter prune operations to resources matching a specific Docker label (e.g. `com.docker.compose.project=mystack`).
   - **Cron Expression**: Standard 5-field cron format. A human-readable preview appears below the input.
   - **Enabled**: Toggle the task on or off.
4. Click **Create**.

<Frame>
  <img src="/images/scheduled-operations/create-dialog.png" alt="Create scheduled task dialog with action, cron expression, and prune target options" />
</Frame>

## Task List

The task list is displayed as a table with the following columns:

| Column | Description |
|--------|-------------|
| **Name** | The task name |
| **Action** | Task type badge: Restart Stack, Fleet Snapshot, System Prune, or Vulnerability Scan |
| **Target** | Stack name (with selected services, if any), or the target type for non-stack actions |
| **Schedule** | Human-readable description with the raw cron expression below |
| **Status** | Last run result: **Success** (green), **Failed** (red), or "Never run" |
| **Next Run** | When the task will next execute |
| **Enabled** | Toggle switch to enable or disable the task |
| **Actions** | Action buttons (see [Managing Tasks](#managing-tasks)) |

## Granular Targeting

### Per-Service Restart

When creating a Restart Stack schedule, you can target individual services instead of restarting the entire stack. After selecting a stack, Sencho reads the compose file and displays checkboxes for each defined service. Select the services you want to restart, or leave all unchecked to restart every service in the stack.

<Frame>
  <img src="/images/scheduled-operations/per-service-restart.png" alt="Service checkboxes displayed when creating a per-service restart schedule" />
</Frame>

### Scheduled Vulnerability Scans

A Vulnerability Scan task runs Trivy against every image on the selected node and persists the results. The scan uses the same digest-based 24-hour cache as manual scans, so unchanged images are not rescanned on every run. See [Vulnerability Scanning](/features/vulnerability-scanning) for how results are surfaced in the UI and [Installing Trivy](/operations/trivy-setup) for setup on each node.

When a scheduled scan finishes, Sencho dispatches a completion notification with a summary of what was scanned and a breakdown of findings by severity. The full message format is documented in [Alerts & Notifications → Scheduled scan completion](/features/alerts-notifications#scheduled-scan-completion).

### Prune Label Filter

When creating a System Prune schedule, you can scope the prune to resources matching a specific Docker label. This lets you target resources from a particular stack or project without affecting unrelated containers, images, or volumes.

Enter a label in `key=value` format (e.g. `com.docker.compose.project=mystack`). Leave the field empty to prune all unused resources of the selected types.

<Frame>
  <img src="/images/scheduled-operations/prune-label-filter.png" alt="Label filter input for scoping prune operations to specific Docker labels" />
</Frame>

## Cron Expression Reference

Sencho uses standard 5-field cron expressions:

```
┌───────────── minute (0–59)
│ ┌─────────── hour (0–23)
│ │ ┌───────── day of month (1–31)
│ │ │ ┌─────── month (1–12)
│ │ │ │ ┌───── day of week (0–7, 0 and 7 = Sunday)
│ │ │ │ │
* * * * *
```

### Common Examples

| Expression | Description |
|-----------|-------------|
| `0 3 * * *` | Every day at 3:00 AM |
| `0 */6 * * *` | Every 6 hours |
| `0 3 * * 0` | Every Sunday at 3:00 AM |
| `30 2 1 * *` | 1st of every month at 2:30 AM |
| `0 0 * * 1-5` | Midnight on weekdays |

## Filtering by Node

When managing a multi-node fleet, you can filter the schedule list to show only tasks targeting a specific node. There are two ways to access this:

- **From the Nodes table:** Click the **calendar icon** on any node row in **Settings → Nodes** to jump directly to the Schedules view filtered to that node.
- **From the Schedules view:** A filter bar appears at the top showing which node you're viewing, with a **Clear filter** button to return to the full list.

When creating a new task while a node filter is active, Sencho pre-selects that node in the create dialog.

## Managing Tasks

Each task row has four action buttons:

- **Run Now** (play icon): Immediately execute the task without waiting for the next scheduled run. Manual runs are labeled "Manual" in the execution history.
- **Execution History** (clock icon): Open the run history panel for this task.
- **Edit** (pencil icon): Modify the task name, action, target, or schedule.
- **Delete** (trash icon): Permanently remove the task and all its execution history after confirmation.

Use the **Enabled** toggle switch in the task list to pause or resume a schedule without deleting it.

## Failure Notifications

When a scheduled task fails, Sencho automatically dispatches an **error-level alert** through your configured notification channels (Discord, Slack, or custom webhooks). The alert includes the task name, action type, and error message so you can diagnose the issue immediately.

When a previously failing task succeeds again, Sencho sends an **info-level recovery notification** to confirm the issue is resolved. This recovery-only approach avoids notification noise from tasks that succeed on every run.

Vulnerability Scan tasks always send a completion notification, even on a clean run, because the message carries severity counts you may want to react to. See [Alerts & Notifications → Scheduled scan completion](/features/alerts-notifications#scheduled-scan-completion) for the full message format.

To configure notification channels, go to **Settings > Notifications**.

<Frame>
  <img src="/images/scheduled-operations/failure-notification.png" alt="Failure notification alert shown in the notification bell popover" />
</Frame>

## Execution History

Click the clock icon on any task to open the run history panel. The history is displayed as a table with the following columns:

| Column | Description |
|--------|-------------|
| **Time** | When the run started |
| **Source** | Whether the run was triggered by the **Scheduler** or **Manual** (via Run Now) |
| **Status** | Success, Failed, or Running |
| **Duration** | How long the run took (in seconds) |
| **Details** | Output summary or error message |

Run history is paginated at 20 entries per page. You can export the full history as CSV using the download button in the panel header.

Execution history is retained for 30 days.

<Frame>
  <img src="/images/scheduled-operations/run-history.png" alt="Execution history showing run source, status, duration, and details with export button" />
</Frame>

## How It Works

The Scheduler Service runs in the background and checks for due tasks every 60 seconds. When a task's next run time has passed:

1. The scheduler verifies your Admiral license is active.
2. It executes the configured action using the same internal services that power the UI buttons (restart, snapshot, prune).
3. Results are logged to the execution history.
4. On failure, an alert is dispatched via your configured notification channels.
5. The next run time is recalculated from the cron expression.

If a task is still running from a previous execution, the scheduler skips it to prevent overlap.

If the server restarts while a task is mid-execution, the orphaned run record is automatically marked as failed with a "Server restarted during execution" message on the next startup. No manual cleanup is needed.

## Troubleshooting

### Task was automatically disabled

If a task's cron expression becomes invalid after creation (for example, due to a corrupt database edit or an expression that was valid in a previous version), the scheduler disables the task and records the reason in the last error column. To fix this:

1. Open the task in edit mode.
2. Re-enter a valid cron expression.
3. Re-enable the task using the toggle switch.

### Run shows "Server restarted during execution"

This means Sencho was restarted (or crashed) while this task was mid-execution. The run was marked as failed automatically on startup. The task itself is still enabled and will run at its next scheduled time. If you want to re-run it immediately, use the **Run Now** button.

### Scheduled scan completed but no notification arrived

The scan notification shares the same delivery path as every other Sencho alert. Check, in order:

1. At least one channel is enabled in **Settings > Notifications** and the **Test** button succeeds for it.
2. If the stack the scan is associated with has notification routes defined, make sure at least one matching route is enabled; the routing layer takes priority over the global channels.
3. Open the notification bell. The in-app bell receives every notification regardless of channel configuration, and a failed external delivery is logged there as an error entry you can inspect.
4. On a remote node, notification channels must be configured on the remote instance itself; channel settings are per-node.

### Scan task fails with "Trivy binary is not available"

Trivy must be installed on the node that runs the scan, not just on the primary instance. Follow [Installing Trivy](/operations/trivy-setup) on the target node, then trigger **Run Now** from the schedule to confirm the scan succeeds before waiting for the next cron tick.
