openclaw - 💡(How to fix) Fix Cron job: ANNOUNCE_SKIP causes agent to skip tasks without warning [1 participants]

Cron job ANNOUNCE_SKIP behavior is confusing and undocumented

Problem Description

When a cron job with sessionTarget: "main" has a payload containing ANNOUNCE_SKIP, the agent appears to skip the task entirely without any indication of why. The resulting behavior is that only partial output (e.g., just an Embedding status check) is sent, making it appear the job failed silently.

Steps to Reproduce

1. Create a cron job with sessionTarget: "main" and delivery.mode: "channel"
2. Set payload message to something like:

   Task 1: check status
   Task 2: send report
   Reply ANNOUNCE_SKIP when done.

3. Trigger the cron job
4. Expected: Full task execution → push report via Feishu
5. Actual: Agent skips the main tasks, sends only partial output (Embedding status)

Root Cause

ANNOUNCE_SKIP appears to be a special control instruction that causes the agent to skip execution entirely. When it appears anywhere in the payload message (even at the end), the agent treats it as a skip signal rather than a completion signal.

Impact

• Jobs configured with ANNOUNCE_SKIP in the payload appear to work (status: ok) but produce no useful output
• No error or warning is logged when ANNOUNCE_SKIP causes a skip
• The difference between isolated (shell script execution) and main (agent execution) is not clearly documented
• Payload content behaves very differently depending on session type:
  • isolated: payload is executed as a shell command
  • main: payload is interpreted as agent instructions

Suggested Improvements

1. Documentation: Clearly document the difference between isolated and main session targets, especially how the payload is interpreted in each case

2. Warning: If ANNOUNCE_SKIP is detected in a main session payload, log a warning

3. Dry-run mode: A cron job dry-run <id> command to test a job without waiting for its schedule

4. Config validation: Validate that ANNOUNCE_SKIP only appears in appropriate contexts

Environment

• OpenClaw: 2026.4.15
• macOS: Darwin 25.4.0
• Node: v25.8.1
• Cron jobs affected: Any main session job with multi-step payloads