Signals

• On the web, Signals sit in the right-hand column of your Dashboard, under Signals.
• In the iPhone and Android app, they appear in a Signals card on the Today tab.
• Each Signal shows a short label (such as At risk or Meeting load), what Chronos noticed, usually a line on why it matters, a suggested action button and Dismiss.
• When there's nothing worth flagging, the section doesn't appear at all.

Every Signal starts from a fixed rule over your own tasks, events, journal, lists and docs. Chronos then writes it up in plain language. Here's each label and what makes it appear.

At risk

The scheduler couldn't place a task safely: it would go over your daily capacity, no free slot fits, or the only slot is after its due date.

Reschedule

Chronos has a reschedule suggestion waiting for one of your tasks, with a better slot that's still ahead.

Unscheduled

A task is due within the next three days but has no time on your calendar.

Meeting load

A day in the coming week has more than four hours of events. Chronos suggests protecting a two-hour focus block.

Timing

A task is scheduled outside your peak hours on a day when your peak hours are free. This needs peak hours set in your energy profile.

Wellness

You haven't written a journal entry for more than three days, or your mood ratings are trending down. It also appears when a day with more than four hours of events is coming up and you haven't journalled for more than four days, suggesting a 90-minute recovery block.

Evening load

You have two or more events starting at 5 pm or later in the next seven days, and your recent journal entries use words like burnt out, exhausted or overwhelmed, or your mood is trending down. Chronos picks the least important one and suggests drafting a polite decline.

Slipping

Two or more reschedule suggestions are waiting and your journal shows the same low-mood or burnout signs.

From your journal

A journal entry from the past week says you “need to”, “have to”, “must” or “should” do something, and Chronos suggests turning it into a task.

Related

A recent journal entry shares at least two words with an unscheduled task that's due within three days.

Worth remembering

Chronos spots a pattern in your recent activity, such as a repeating task you keep skipping or project blocks that keep running over, and offers to save it to its memory. Once you save or dismiss a pattern, it isn't offered again.

Attachment

A task and one of your lists or docs share a topic (shopping or groceries, calls, meetings, or trips), and Chronos offers to attach it.

Mood trends need at least three mood ratings in your journal from the past week. Journal-based Signals only look at the last seven days of entries.

• Dismiss removes the Signal for the rest of the day.
• Attach the list or Attach the doclinks the list or doc to the task, so it shows in the task's resources.
• Save this to memory adds the pattern to what Chronos Agent remembers about you.
• Run a reschedule analysis (on At risk and Slipping) doesn't move anything. It works out better slots for tasks that need them, and those come back as Reschedule Signals in the next morning's list.
• After an action that can be reversed, a Done. message offers Undofor 10 seconds. Actions that can't be reversed say so instead.

For anything you'd rather do your own way, ask Chronos Agent. For example, “find me a two-hour focus block on Thursday” or “draft a polite decline for my 6 pm event on Wednesday”. In the app, the Ask Chronos link on the Signals card opens the chat.

As well as the At risk Signal, today's at-risk tasks are marked right in your Dashboard schedule with Over capacity, No slot fits or Past due, plus these buttons:

• Find it a slot asks Chronos Agent, in the Dashboard chat, to find the task a new slot and move it there (Pro, Teams and trial).
• Adjust capacity opens Settings › Schedule, where you can change your availability and Max Scheduled Hours Per Day.
• Accept the missclears the warning when you're fine with the task slipping. You have 10 seconds to Undo.

When two or more of today's tasks are at risk, Chronos sums them up in one line (for example, “3 tasks are over capacity”) with a single Fix button. In the app, at-risk tasks carry an At risk badge in Today's schedule.

• Chronos looks for Signals once a day, at about 6 am in the Timezone set in Settings › Account. If you open the Dashboard or Today before that has happened, Chronos looks then, and anything it finds shows the next time you load the page.
• You get up to eight Signals a day, most urgent first. At-risk tasks, waiting reschedule suggestions and evening overload come before gentler nudges.
• Signals last for the day. If the cause is still there tomorrow, the Signal can come back, except attachment suggestions, which Chronos makes only once for each task and list or doc.
• The web Dashboard loads Signals when you open it. The app reloads them whenever you return to Today, or when you pull down to refresh.
• If you've connected Slack, the morning's Signals also arrive as Slack messages with Accept and Dismiss buttons. Turn them off with the Agent interventions switch on the Slack card in Settings › Integrations.

• Nothing changes until you tap an action. Seeing or dismissing a Signal changes nothing.
• Signals never suggest moving your events. Timing suggestions are for tasks only. An event in your peak hours simply counts as that time being used.
• A suggested decline is only a draft. Chronos never sends anything for you.
• Signals only use your own tasks, events, journal, lists and docs, plus tasks assigned to you.

Alongside Signals, Chronos writes a short summary of your day. On the web it sits above your schedule on the Dashboard, and in the app it appears under the greeting on Today. It's for reading only, so there's nothing to accept or dismiss.

Related articles

• Chronos Agent — chat with your schedule
• Automatic scheduling — capacity, at-risk tasks and how slots are chosen
• Energy profile — set your peak hours
• Journal — entries and mood