Automations

The automation engine turns any platform event into a rule you build visually: When an event fires, If conditions hold, Then run actions. It is an optional module, enabled by default and toggleable per competition.

The rule model

• When (trigger) — any event from the event catalogue, verbatim: challenge.solved, ticket.created, competition.ended, … Anything that emits an event is automatable; new platform events become triggers automatically.
• If (conditions) — zero or more field · operator · value checks against the event’s payload, AND-ed together. Operators: equals, does not equal, contains, greater than, at least, less than, at most, is present, is absent.
• Then (actions) — one or more of the thirteen action types, executed in order.

Rules live on the Automations page of a competition; the visual builder is generated from a server catalogue, so it always matches what the backend actually supports. Since v1.4.0 the builder speaks human: condition fields show readable labels (“Minutes remaining”, not minutes_remaining), and every ID field is a searchable name dropdown — challenges, hints, surveys, teams and users are picked by name while the rule still stores the id (a hint picker cascades competition → challenge → hint, and a global rule gets an inline competition selector).

Rule scopes and who can create what

Rule type	Fires for	Requires
Competition rule	One competition’s events	automation_create / automation_edit in that competition (Judge has these)
Global rule	Every competition’s events	The same permissions held globally (Administrator); managed under Admin → Automations
Personal rule	Only events you caused	No permissions — but restricted to the notify me action

Personal rules are a saved search that pings you (“notify me when I solve something”), never a way to run privileged actions.

Trigger authorization: each event is governed by the permission that lets you observe it — a Judge can build rules on solves and tickets, but can’t automate on role.assigned or other admin-only events. The builder only offers triggers you’re allowed to use.

Time-based triggers

competition.time_remaining fires from a per-minute scheduler rather than a mutation: a rule with a condition like minutes_remaining · is at most · 60 fires once, when the threshold is first crossed. This is the natural partner of the open_survey action:

An hour before the end → open the feedback survey → notify participants.

The scheduler also emits competition.started / competition.ended as the clock crosses the schedule, so lifecycle rules need no manual step.

Actions worth knowing about

The full field-by-field list is in the automation reference; highlights:

• notify — in-app notification to the event’s user/team, a role, or yourself (personal rules).
• send_email — templated email; silently does nothing until SMTP is configured.
• webhook — outbound HTTP with serious hardening: SSRF blocklisting on every call, credential-header stripping, content-type-aware escaping, and chat-token defanging, because team names are adversarial input. See Security notes.
• release_hint / publish_hint / unlock_challenge — grant a hint free to the event’s user/team; publish a hidden hint to everyone (v1.4.0 — the timed-hint-wave tool, alongside scheduled release times); unlock bonus challenges.
• update_score / create_award — point adjustments and titled, point-carrying awards.
• freeze_scoreboard / unfreeze_scoreboard / create_announcement / open_survey / create_ticket — event operations without a human in the loop.

Values marked templateable interpolate event payload fields with {placeholders} — e.g. a webhook body of {"text": "First blood on {challenge_id}!"}.

Guard rails

• automation.* events are never triggerable (no trivial self-loops), and a cascade-depth cap stops chains of rules triggering each other indefinitely.
• Rules run on a background lane — a slow webhook never delays the request that caused the event.
• Disabling the Automations module for a competition stops all rules — including global ones — firing for that competition’s events.
• Every fire updates the rule’s trigger count and timestamp and emits automation.rule_triggered into the audit log.

Recipes

Goal	When	If	Then
Celebrate first blood	challenge.solved	is_first_blood equals true	create_announcement + create_award
End-of-event survey	competition.time_remaining	minutes_remaining is at most 60	open_survey + notify (role: Participant)
Lock the final hour	competition.ended	—	freeze_scoreboard
Ops visibility	ticket.created	—	webhook to your team chat
Reward early registration	team.created	—	notify (event team)