Schedule change of hourly run calculation

[Walter.Koller]

The current way on how hourly runs are calculated is misleading and and limits functionality.

There are two date/time definitions in a Schedule:
Schedule:
Runs (eg HourlyMinutely)
Start on (eg 19.10.2021) 
Run At (eg 10:00)
Run hourly / minutely
Every (eg 5 hours)
between (eg 06:00 and 16:00

Expected behavior of the schedule would be to have following time table:
19.10., 11:00
19.10., 16:00
20.10., 06:00
20.10., 11:00
20.10., 16:00
.. to run at the same hours in the specified window.

The actual runs are scheduled for:
19.10., 11:00
19.10., 16:00
20.10., 07:00
20.10., 12:00
21.10., 08:00
The calculation is based on the initial Run At time and the hours are simply added regardless of day ends. (Since 5h frequency put in a calendar day is 24h +1h, there is a 1h shift in execution each day).
This is not only very confusing but also limits the hourly runs to values that can divide 24 with no remainder.

Please change the calculation to be based on the start value of the time window in the hourly parameter definition.
Or change the calculation to be always based at the Run At time each day. (so no continues calculation but resets for each calendar day)

[chris.strong]

There is a few different, but related ideas to better calendar based scheduling, so I’ll reference them here:

• Idea: Control Room Calendar function enhancement
• Idea: Scheduling Options to Schedule a process on Nth Working Day
• Idea: Schedule change of hourly run calculation (this one)

Kind regards

Chris Strong

SS&C Blue Prism Product Manager