What would be a good name for a job schedule?

Posted on

Question :

I have encountered many different names for job schedules in SQL Server, ranging from the job name where it is used to a short recap of the schedule itself. I would like to give a clear, descriptive and consistent name to new job schedules, so it could be re-used easily and it’s easy to see what kind of schedule it is.

Examples of encountered job schedule names:

Run every night
Every 4 weeks on Monday
Schedule job X
21.00hr
DAILY (which then runs only 6 days a week)

I find it hard to think of a good way to name them. So: what would be smart, consistent names to give to a job schedule? How do you name them? Why?

Answer :

It seems to me that using a job name in the schedule name prevents it from being re-used, so I’ve chosen to focus on a shorthand for the schedule contents. I’m now using the following naming convention:

times per week - days of the week - run time

So for the examples in the question the new names would become:

  • Run every night -> 7xPW - MTWTFSS - 22.00
  • Every 4 weeks on Monday -> 0xPW - Mxxxxxx - 6.15
  • 21.00hr -> 5xPW - MTxTFSx - 21.00
  • DAILY (which then runs only 6 days a week) -> 6xPW - MTWTFSx - 0.00

This seems to work for now because we have lots of weekly and once-a-day jobs. I’m not utterly happy with the 0xPW for schedules that occur every 4 weeks or monthly (what are we gonna do with the job that runs every 4th day of every month?), but it’s not a big deal and the 0xPW at least tells us to look to the description for more info.

The daily jobs that run every xx minutes are not straightforward to name in the above manner – although 2016xPW - MTWTFSS for a once-every-5-minutes schedule is pretty telling.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *