CronSignal MCP Server

Monitor your cron jobs with AI. Get alerted when they fail. Debug them in seconds.

Your backup failed 3 hours ago. You just found out.

CronSignal MCP connects your AI assistant (Claude, Cursor, Claude Code) directly to your cron job monitoring. Create monitors, check status, and debug failures—all through natural conversation.

What You Can Do

Ask your AI assistant:

• "Create a monitor for my nightly backup"
• "Why is my ETL job failing?"
• "How are my cron jobs doing?"
• "Pause monitoring while I deploy"

The AI handles the rest—creating monitors, analyzing errors, and suggesting fixes.

Quick Start

1. Get Your Free API Key

→ cronsignal.io/mcp (takes 30 seconds)

2. Add to Your AI Assistant

Add to your Claude config:

• macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
• Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "cronsignal": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["cronsignal-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "CRONSIGNAL_API_KEY": "cs_live_your_key_here"
      }
    }
  }
}

claude mcp add cronsignal -- npx cronsignal-mcp

Then set your API key:

claude mcp update cronsignal -e CRONSIGNAL_API_KEY=cs_live_your_key_here

Add to your Cursor MCP settings (~/.cursor/mcp.json):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "cronsignal": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["cronsignal-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "CRONSIGNAL_API_KEY": "cs_live_your_key_here"
      }
    }
  }
}

3. Start Monitoring

Restart your AI assistant, then ask:

"Create a monitor for my daily backup that runs at 2 AM"

Real-World Examples

Debugging a Failed Job

You: "My backup job is failing, can you help?"

Claude: (uses diagnose_check)

🔍 Diagnosis for "Nightly Backup"

Issues Found:
- 🔴 Monitor is DOWN (last ping: 3 hours ago)
- ❌ Last 3 pings had non-zero exit codes
- 🔒 Permission errors detected in output

Captured Error:
pg_dump: error: connection to server failed: FATAL: password authentication failed

Suggested Actions:
• Verify database credentials in your backup script
• Check if the password was recently rotated

Creating a Monitor with Output Capture

You: "Set up monitoring for my ETL pipeline that runs every 6 hours"

Claude: (uses create_check)

✅ Monitor created!

Add this to your cron job to capture output:

your-etl-script.sh 2>&1 | curl -fsS -X POST -d @- https://api.cronsignal.io/ping/abc123

Quick Status Check

You: "How are my monitors doing?"

Claude: (uses list_checks)

Found 3 monitors:

✅ Nightly Backup (chk_abc123)
   Status: up | Period: 24h | Last ping: 2 hours ago

✅ ETL Pipeline (chk_def456)
   Status: up | Period: 6h | Last ping: 45 minutes ago

🔴 Report Generator (chk_ghi789)
   Status: down | Period: 1h | Last ping: 3 hours ago

Available Tools

| Tool | What It Does | |------|--------------| | list_checks | See all monitors and their current status | | get_check | Get detailed stats for a specific monitor | | create_check | Create a new monitor (returns ping URL + code snippets) | | update_check | Change name, period, or grace period | | delete_check | Remove a monitor permanently | | pause_check | Pause alerts during maintenance | | resume_check | Resume monitoring after maintenance | | get_check_output | View captured stdout/stderr from recent runs | | diagnose_check | AI-powered failure analysis with fix suggestions |

Perfect For

• Database backups — Know immediately if pg_dump or mysqldump fails
• ETL pipelines — Catch data sync issues before they cascade
• Report generation — Ensure daily/weekly reports actually ran
• Cleanup scripts — Verify log rotation and temp file cleanup
• Scheduled deployments — Confirm CI/CD jobs completed

Output Capture

CronSignal captures your job's stdout/stderr, so when something fails, the AI can read the actual error message and suggest fixes.

# Capture output and send to CronSignal
your-script.sh 2>&1 | curl -fsS -X POST -d @- https://api.cronsignal.io/ping/YOUR_ID

# Or just send the exit code
your-script.sh; curl -fsS "https://api.cronsignal.io/ping/YOUR_ID?exit_code=$?"

Why MCP?

| Traditional Dashboard | With MCP | |----------------------|----------| | Switch to browser | Ask from your editor | | Click through UI | Natural language | | Read logs manually | AI analyzes for you | | Generic alerts | Contextual fix suggestions |

Environment Variables

| Variable | Required | Description | |----------|----------|-------------| | CRONSIGNAL_API_KEY | Yes | Your API key from cronsignal.io/mcp |

Links

• Get API Key — Free to start
• Documentation — Full setup guide
• CronSignal — Main website

License

MIT

Built for developers who want their cron jobs to just work.