Routines That Run the House

Routines, in plain words

A routine is a job a bot does on a schedule, or when something happens. "Every weekday at 7 AM, send me my morning brief." "When a bill email arrives, add it to the list and set a reminder."

Start small

The biggest mistake people make with routines is setting up too many at once. Suddenly the phone buzzes all day with reports, and they stop reading any of them.

A household's routines

Here's what the Parks end up with after a couple of months. It's an example, not a target.

The morning brief

If you set up only one routine, make it this one. It pulls together the other bots' work into one short message.

Event triggers

Some routines work better when they start from an event rather than a clock. A new email from the school.

Keeping it quiet

A household's admin should get quieter with bots, not louder. A few rules help:

• One brief, not ten notifications.
• Skip a report if there's nothing new.
• Weekly instead of daily where it doesn't matter.
• Short reports. If you scroll, it's too long.

Usage limits

Every routine uses some of your Grok Bot allowance. My first book explains how usage limits work and how to check what you have left.

When a routine goes wrong

At some point, a routine will do something odd. The brief misses an appointment.

Sharing with your household

If you share a home, think about who the routines are for. The morning brief might go to both adults.

Walkthrough: building the morning brief

Building it up slowly means you notice which parts you actually read.

What went wrong: the brief that grew

After two months, the Parks' brief had grown to include weather, news headlines, the investment note, house listings and a quote of the day. It was long, and they stopped reading it.

A household rhythm

The Parks' routines settled into a simple pattern: one daily brief, one weekly errands list, one monthly money summary and a calendar tidy. Everything else is on demand.

A worked example: the week the routines broke

One week, the Parks' morning brief stopped arriving. It turned out their weekly usage allowance had run out early, because a house-hunting routine had been set to check every hour instead of twice a week after an edit.

A worked example: the shared brief

The Parks tried sending one morning brief to both adults. It didn't quite work, because each of them cared about different things.

Questions people ask

What time should the brief arrive? Before you'd normally check your phone.