Task

Task Management

Create, edit, and manage scheduled tasks. Tasks live at ~/.abtars/tasks/ — each task is a directory.

Structure

~/.abtars/tasks/
├── tasks.json              # Registry: schedule, kind, taskFile path (definitions only)
├── task-state.json          # Runtime state (auto-managed, do not edit)
├── task-history.jsonl       # Append-only run log (auto-managed)
├── my-task/
│   ├── TASK.md              # Main prompt (what the agent does)
│   ├── feeds.json           # Associated data (auto-injected)
│   └── report-template.md   # Any supporting files

All files in a task directory (except TASK.md) are automatically injected as context when the task runs.

Creating a task

1. Create the directory and TASK.md:

mkdir -p ~/.abtars/tasks/my-task
cat > ~/.abtars/tasks/my-task/TASK.md 

Schedule format

Standard cron: minute hour day month weekday

| Example | Meaning | |---------|---------| | 0 9 * * * | Daily at 9am | | 30 8 * * 1-5 | Weekdays at 8:30am | | 0 0 * * * | Midnight daily | | 0 */6 * * * | Every 6 hours |

For one-shot tasks, use --at "2026-12-25T08:00" instead of --schedule.

Task kinds

| Kind | Behavior | |------|----------| | agent | Agent session runs the prompt or TASK.md | | script | Shell command runs directly | | reminder | Simple text reminder at scheduled time | | orc | Orc project dispatch | | system | Internal bridge action (sleep-cycle, hardware-sleep) |

Delivery modes

Set delivery in tasks.json. Each kind has a required delivery mode.

| Mode | Behavior | Use for | |------|----------|---------| | report | Drop the result file to chat (no model call) | Reports, generated documents | | announce | Send the agent's response text directly | Greetings, conversational tasks | | silent | No output to user | Internal housekeeping, scripts |

Example:

{
  "id": "finance-report",
  "kind": "agent",
  "agent": "task",
  "delivery": "report",
  "schedule": "30 9 * * *",
  "prompt": "Run the finance report",
  "chatId": "7773842843",
  "enabled": true
}

Managing tasks

abtars-task list                # Show all tasks
abtars-task remove          # Delete a task
abtars-task pause           # Pause a task
abtars-task resume          # Resume a paused task
abtars-task history         # Show run history
abtars-task validate [path]     # Dry-run check of tasks.json (default: live file)

abtars-task validate checks a whole tasks.json before it goes live: invalid entries, duplicate IDs, missing taskFile and report.requires.files paths, and orphaned task package directories. It prints one JSON result, exits 0 when clean and 1 otherwise, and never changes files or task state. Run it after any manual edit of ~/.abtars/tasks/tasks.json.

Or via Telegram: /tasks (list), /task run (trigger), /task pause , /task resume .

Tips

• Keep TASK.md focused — one clear instruction per task
• Put data files (feeds, watchlists, templates) as siblings — they auto-inject
• Use schedule for recurring tasks and at for one-shots
• The DoD section in TASK.md must contain absolute paths only (one per bullet)

Source & license

This open-source skill is cataloged on AgentStack and links to its original source — we do not rehost the code.

• Author: aksika
• Source: aksika/abtars
• License: Apache-2.0
• Homepage: https://aksika.github.io/

Install and usage instructions live in the source repository linked above.