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Quick Start

Get a prompt running on a schedule in under five minutes.

Step 1 — Capture Your Environment

Run this once after installing aias:

aias install

This snapshots your current shell's PATH, API keys, and AIA_* variables into ~/.config/aia/schedule/env.sh. Every cron job sources that file so aia and its dependencies are available at run time.

Re-run aias install whenever you rotate an API key, install a new MCP server binary, or change your Ruby version.

See Cron Environment for full details.

Step 2 — Add a schedule: Key to a Prompt

Open any AIA prompt file (.md in your prompts directory) and add a schedule: key to its YAML frontmatter:

---
description: Morning digest
schedule: "0 8 * * *"
---
Summarize what happened overnight in the Ruby and AI ecosystems.
Keep the summary under 300 words.

The schedule: value accepts either a raw cron expression or a natural-language string. See Scheduling Prompts for the full syntax.

Step 3 — Preview the Crontab Entry

Before writing anything, see what aias would install:

aias dry-run

Example output:

0 8 * * * /bin/bash -c 'source ~/.config/aia/schedule/env.sh && \
  aia --prompts-dir /Users/you/.prompts \
      --config ~/.config/aia/schedule/aia.yml \
      daily_digest > ~/.config/aia/schedule/logs/daily_digest.log 2>&1'

Step 4 — Install

aias update

aias scans every prompt file, validates the scheduled ones, and replaces the entire aias-managed block in your crontab:

aias: installed 1 job(s)

Step 5 — Confirm

aias list

PROMPT ID                       SCHEDULE         LOG
------------------------------  ---------------  -----------------------------------------------
daily_digest                    0 8 * * *        /Users/you/.config/aia/schedule/logs/daily_digest.log

aias check

When everything is in sync:

=== aias check ===

OK — crontab is in sync with scheduled prompts

Step 6 — Add More Prompts (Optional)

Every aias update is a full sync. Add schedule: to more prompts, then run update again — new prompts are added, removed prompts are cleaned up automatically.

What Happens at Runtime

When cron fires the job:

  1. env.sh is sourced — PATH, API keys, and AIA variables are set
  2. aia is invoked with the prompts directory and schedule config
  3. AIA reads the prompt file, merges its frontmatter over the schedule config
  4. The prompt runs using the model and settings defined in the frontmatter (or the schedule config defaults)
  5. All output is written to ~/.config/aia/schedule/logs/<prompt_id>.log

See Configuration Layering for how env.sh, the schedule config, and prompt frontmatter combine.

Disabling a Prompt

Remove or comment out the schedule: line, then run aias update. The orphaned crontab entry is removed automatically.