Triggers
Schedule workflows on a cron, watch for file changes, or receive inbound webhooks to start flows automatically.
The Triggers screen lets you configure automations that start workflows without manual intervention. Triggers are loaded from your workspace configuration and polled live every 5 seconds.
Trigger types
| Type | Description |
|---|---|
| Cron | Runs a workflow on a schedule using a cron expression (e.g. every night at midnight). |
| File watch | Runs a workflow when a file or folder changes on disk. |
| Webhook | Runs a workflow when an HTTP POST arrives at the AKOS webhook endpoint. |
| Inline | Defined directly inside a flow's Trigger node (configured from the flow editor). |
Trigger list
The screen shows three panels:
- Cron — lists all active cron triggers with their ID, kind, and time until the next fire.
- File watchers — lists all active file-watch triggers.
- Inline triggers — a table of triggers defined inside flows, editable from this screen.
Each row has a Runs button that jumps to the Runs screen pre-filtered to runs started by that trigger.
Webhook server
If any webhook triggers are active, a banner at the top of the screen shows the current webhook server address and the registered paths. Example:
To make the webhook server reachable from the internet, start AKOS with the --public flag or set AKOS_WEBHOOK_HOST=0.0.0.0 in your environment.
Adding a trigger
To add a trigger quickly, open the command palette (Cmd K) and search for:
- Add cron trigger
- Add webhook trigger
- Add file watcher
These commands open the trigger editor pre-filled with the selected kind.
Trigger editor (inline triggers)
The inline trigger editor is embedded at the bottom of the Triggers screen. It lists all inline triggers (those defined inside flow Trigger nodes) and lets you edit them without opening the flow editor.
Cron fields
- ID — unique identifier for this trigger.
- Cron expression — standard 5-field cron syntax.
- Flow — the workflow to run when the trigger fires.
- Input — optional static JSON to pass as the flow's input.
File-watch fields
- Path — the file or directory to watch.
- Events — which events to watch for (create, modify, delete).
- Flow — the workflow to run.
Webhook fields
- Path — the URL path for this webhook (e.g.
/webhook/github). - Provider — the webhook provider; AKOS verifies the request signature automatically for supported providers (GitHub, Stripe, Slack, PagerDuty, Sentry, Linear, Twilio).
- Flow — the workflow to run.
- Copy URL — copies the full inbound URL for this webhook to the clipboard.