Use This Skill

Put this line at the very top of any scheduled job prompt:

@scheduled-job-best-practices

Then write your task below it.

Core Principles

•No magic injection. Do not assume placeholders like TODAY exist. Compute runtime values using tools (bash) during the run.
•Non-interactive. Scheduled jobs must not rely on QR codes, manual logins, or confirmation dialogs.
•Idempotent. Make reruns safe (maintain a seen/state file; avoid duplicate messages).
•Observable. Print a short summary at the end with status + outputs.
•Minimal side effects. Write durable artifacts under outputs/ in the job workdir.

Runtime Values: Dates

If you need local dates, compute them at runtime.

macOS

bash

TODAY="$(date +%F)"
TOMORROW="$(date -v+1d +%F)"

Linux

bash

TODAY="$(date +%F)"
TOMORROW="$(date -d 'tomorrow' +%F)"

Portable snippet

bash

if [ "$(uname)" = "Darwin" ]; then
  TODAY="$(date +%F)"
  TOMORROW="$(date -v+1d +%F)"
else
  TODAY="$(date +%F)"
  TOMORROW="$(date -d 'tomorrow' +%F)"
fi

If timezone matters, set TZ explicitly (example: TZ=America/Los_Angeles date +%F).

Preflight Checklist

Before doing any expensive work:

•Confirm required tools are available (browser, network, etc).
•Confirm required env vars exist (source .env only if needed).
•If a dependency is missing/offline, stop early and emit a single concise reason.

Notifications (Telegram)

Prefer the Telegram Bot API (non-interactive) over web.telegram.org.

Output Contract

End every run with a compact summary:

•Status: success | skipped | failed
•Reason (1 line)
•Outputs written (paths)
•Notifications sent (message_id, chat_id) if applicable

Idempotency Pattern

When notifying about “new” items (deals, alerts, etc.):

•Store a seen list in outputs/<job>/seen.json
•Only notify on items not in seen.json
•Update seen.json after sending