Automations
An automation is an instruction CoChat runs for you without you being there — every morning, every Friday at five, whenever a feed has a new item, or whenever someone mentions your assistant in Slack. Each run produces a result that lands in a chat, your inbox or your Pulse feed, and every run is recorded so you can see what happened.
For work that should continue from the chat you’re already in, see Scheduled deliverables.
Where to find them
Section titled “Where to find them”- Go to app.cochat.ai/automations for everything you’ve built.
- Open an assistant and use its Automations tab for the ones assigned to that assistant (see Setting up an assistant).
The two are the same thing. An automation made from an assistant’s page runs with that assistant’s personality, model and tools; one made from the Automations page runs with the default model and no assistant.
The list
Section titled “The list”Each automation shows its name, when it triggers (“Every 6 hours”, “Every weekday at 08:00”, “Manual only”, “RSS every 15 min”…), its next and last run, and a chip reading Enabled or Disabled — click the chip to switch it on or off. Buttons on each row: Run now, Edit, Runs (history) and Delete.
Delete removes the automation straight away, without asking. Run now works even when the automation is disabled; the run happens in the background, so click Refresh to see it appear.
Creating one
Section titled “Creating one”Click New automation. You can Start from Scratch or pick a template — Weekly Summary, Weekly Chat Digest, Research Alert, Slack Bot, Daily Briefing, Daily Analytics Report, Repository Activity Digest, Social Media Post Generator. Templates that need a connected integration say so (“Requires: Slack”).
The editor has a name, an optional description, and four tabs.
Schedule — when it runs
Section titled “Schedule — when it runs”| Trigger | When it runs | Settings |
|---|---|---|
| Interval | Repeatedly, at a fixed gap | Every N hours or days (minimum 1 hour) |
| Schedule | Specific days and times, like a calendar alarm | Time, days of the week, timezone. An Advanced option accepts a raw cron expression |
| Webhook | When an outside service sends a request to a unique URL | Save first, then copy the webhook URL shown |
| Polling | When the content of a web page changes | The URL, and how often to check (minimum 5 minutes) |
| RSS Feed | When a feed has new items | The feed URL, and how often to check (minimum 5 minutes) |
| Integration Trigger | When an event fires in a connected integration | Pick the trigger — for Slack, Bot mentioned or Message in channel — and optionally limit it to certain channels |
| Manual | Only when you click Run now | — |
Integration triggers only list integrations you’ve connected (see Connecting tools).
Task — what it does
Section titled “Task — what it does”Write the Task Prompt: exactly what the assistant should do each time the automation runs, as if you were typing it in chat. You can use placeholders — {{date}} for today’s date, {{previous_output}} for the last run’s result, and for integration triggers {{integration_event}} for the message that fired it.
Add additional instructions lets you add standing guidance on top of the assistant’s personality — tone, format, things to avoid.
Output — where the result goes
Section titled “Output — where the result goes”- Output Mode: Report (the assistant writes one clean, standalone report) or Full Output (the whole working transcript is kept).
- Save result to CoChat: under Chat behavior, either Create a new chat for each run, titled from a template (the default is the automation’s name plus the date), or Continue an existing chat, where each run adds a new message to a chat you pick. The picker lists your own chats; the automation cannot be saved without a target, and a target you can no longer write to fails the run with a message in its run history.
- Email output: sends the result to your account email.
- Push notification for each result: when a run finishes with results, CoChat sends a push notification to each device where push is on. Tapping it opens the run’s chat, or the automation’s runs when it saved no chat. A run with no new results sends none. It is on when Email output is on, until you change it; it shows only where push notifications are available. One-time tasks you schedule from a chat get it too. Results from your automations under Settings → Notifications turns it off for every automation.
- Show in Pulse: lets the assistant post an insight card to your Pulse feed when it has something worth flagging. (Every run appears in Pulse’s Automations tab regardless.)
Limits — optional guard rails
Section titled “Limits — optional guard rails”- Limit number of runs: after N runs the automation disables itself.
- Set max runtime: stop a run after N minutes (up to 30; the default is 10).
Finishing
Section titled “Finishing”Test validates the automation and does a dry run without saving. Tick Enabled if you want it live immediately, then Create (or Save Changes).
Run history
Section titled “Run history”Runs on an automation shows its last 50 runs: when each started, its status (completed, failed or running), a progress note, how long it took and how many actions it performed. Click a run for Run Details — the full execution log, any error, and the results of each action. Run Now and Edit are on this page too.
When a run fails or times out, CoChat sends a push notification to each device where push is on, at most one a day per automation; tapping it opens the automation’s runs. One-time tasks are included. A run stopped because you’re out of credit sends none. Turn it off with Automation alerts under Settings → Notifications.
Limits and cost
Section titled “Limits and cost”Your plan sets how many automations can be enabled at once — see Plans and limits. If you’re at the limit, you can still create a new automation; it’s saved paused, with a note offering to upgrade. Turning another one on at the limit is refused.
Each run uses credits exactly like a chat turn of the same size, from your daily allowance first and then your balance. If a run can’t proceed because you’re out of credit, the automation pauses itself and resumes on its own once your balance recovers. Runs that fail for other reasons aren’t retried; a couple of failures in a row will pause the automation until you re-enable it. An automation is also turned off when its model is no longer on your plan, and a research alert pauses after several runs with no new results. Each time, CoChat sends you a push notification (a research alert’s pause also comes by email), the list shows the automation as Disabled, and its run history says why. When a run goes without one of the tools it is set up to use, you get an email and a push the first time it happens. Automation alerts under Settings → Notifications has a switch for the email and one for the push.
- Friday week-in-review — Schedule, Fridays 17:00: “Summarise what I worked on this week and what’s still open.” Output: Report, saved to a chat.
- Weekly paper digest — Schedule, Mondays 08:00, from the Research Alert template with your topic. Output: Report, emailed.
- Weekday morning briefing — Schedule, weekdays 08:00, with your calendar and email connected: “Give me a briefing for today.” Output: Show in Pulse.
- Blog watcher — RSS Feed, every 30 minutes: “Summarise each new post and say whether it’s relevant to my project.”
- Slack responder — Integration Trigger, Slack “Bot mentioned”, assigned to a support assistant.
Track new papers
Section titled “Track new papers”During onboarding you may be offered Track new papers automatically. Entering a topic there creates a real Research Alert automation — it appears in your list like any other and you can edit or disable it. For continuous paper tracking tied to a research question, see Radar instead.