Automations

Claude and ChatGPT can already run a prompt on a schedule. Automations make that far more useful:

• The result comes to you. Instead of sitting in a chat you have to go and find, each result lands in your inbox, laid out to read - and can go to other people too.
• Its context stays current. Point it at a list - your portfolio, the topics you follow, this week's tasks - and every run works from that list as it is now. Change the list and the next run changes with it, so a job you set up months ago is still relevant.
• It uses the assistant you already pay for. The work runs on your own Claude or ChatGPT subscription, with everything it can already do, so there's no extra AI to pay for.

An automation is a prompt you keep in Apricot, with a list for it to work from. You schedule it in your assistant. Each time it runs, your assistant fetches the prompt and the list from Apricot, does the work, and sends the result back - and we email it to you and keep a copy.

Open Automations

1. 1

   In Automations, choose New automation, or start from one of the Templates.

2. 2

   Write the prompt, choose a list for it to work from if it needs one, and save.

3. 3

   On its page, copy the test prompt into a chat with your assistant. It runs once, so you can see the result.

4. 4

   Copy the prompt to schedule and make it a scheduled task in your assistant - a scheduled task in Claude, a Task in ChatGPT. That's where you choose when it runs.

5. 5

   In your assistant's connector settings, let run_automation and deliver_automation_result run without asking. Otherwise a scheduled run stops and waits for you to press Allow.

Just ask: "Make me an automation that…". Your assistant writes the prompt, saves it in Apricot, and schedules it if it can - or tells you exactly what to paste. It can change, pause and delete them for you too.

Not sure where your assistant keeps scheduled tasks? Each automation's page has a prompt that gets your assistant to walk you through its own settings.

An automation can read one Note List or Task List each time it runs - the topics to research, the companies to watch, the holdings in your portfolio, the tasks to plan. It gets the open items as they are at that moment, so updating the list updates the next run.

Forms can't be used: their responses come from people outside your lists.

Apricot can't see inside your assistant, so each automation's page shows two things: when your assistant says it runs (it notes this when it schedules one, or you can type it in), and what its runs actually show - like "Weekdays around 07:02".

Once there's a pattern, an automation whose next run doesn't turn up says Running late.

Pause an automation on its page, or ask your assistant to. While it's paused, every run is turned away before anything happens - even if your assistant's schedule still fires - and it costs you nothing. Resume it whenever you like.

Each result arrives by email - a summary, the full result with any tables, and its sources - and stays on the automation's page for 180 days.

Your assistant writes the results, not us, and nobody checks them. Treat the facts and links as you would anything else it writes.

On an automation's page, under Who gets the results, ask someone from your People to get it too. They're emailed an invitation, and nothing is sent until they say yes in Apricot. You can remove them at any time.

They get every result in full, including anything from the list it reads - so only ask people you'd share that with.

• Free: up to 2 people on each automation.
• Pro: up to 5 people on each automation.
• Max: up to 15 people on each automation.

If someone asks you to get their automation, it appears under Shared with me on your Automations page. Say yes and each result comes to your inbox. You see its name and who it's from - never their prompt.

Stop whenever you like: Unsubscribe there, or in any of its emails.

Each run uses one automation run, and at least two assistant calls. Both reset on the 1st. If you're out of runs, your assistant is told before it does any work. Every weekday comes to about 22 runs a month; once a week, about 4.

• Free: 30 automation runs a month.
• Pro: 90 automation runs a month.
• Max: 300 automation runs a month.

Check the automation's page first - the result may be there. If nothing ran, it's usually one of these:

• The scheduled task is off, or set for a different time, in your assistant.
• The Apricot connector isn't switched on for that scheduled task.
• A tool asked for approval and nobody was there. Let the two automation tools run without asking.
• The automation is paused, or you're out of runs or assistant calls this month.
• The email went to spam.