Task scheduling

Task scheduling is a system management feature that allows you to automate routine jobs to run once or on a recurring basis.

Time zones and seasonal time changes

Tasks are scheduled in Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), which remains constant year-round. Scheduled tasks do not adjust automatically for local time changes, such as daylight saving time or summer time. For example, a task scheduled for 2:00 a.m. during standard time runs at 3:00 a.m. after the local clock moves forward.

The Cloud-Delivered Firewall Management Center evaluates scheduled task times in the display time zone configured for the user who creates the task. If that time zone observes daylight saving time (DST), a task scheduled during the hour skipped when clocks move forward does not run that day, and no error is generated. A task scheduled during the repeated hour when clocks move back runs twice.

To avoid missed or duplicate runs, create reliability-critical tasks, such as backups and feed updates, using a user whose display time zone is UTC or a time zone that does not observe DST, such as Etc/GMT+5 or America/Phoenix.

This behavior can affect device configuration backups, Security Intelligence feed, URL, and DNS updates, VDB and GeoDB updates, scheduled reports, and license reconciliation jobs.

Automatically scheduled tasks

The system automatically schedules these tasks:

  • A one-time task to download and install the latest VDB, at initial setup.

  • A weekly task to download the latest available, starting at initial setup.

  • A daily task to updated certificate revocation lists (CRL), when you configure user or audit log certificates.