Daily Briefing

daily-briefing

Generates a compact, warm daily message suitable for cron delivery (stdout/chat reply). Always succeeds even with minimal context.

Skill Type: System Skill (Orchestrator Pattern)

This skill uses the System Skill pattern for execution on macOS. The agent must:

1. Never run raw CLI commands directly (except curl for weather).
2. Always invoke the runner script to gather data.
3. Read gathered data from JSON after the script completes.
4. Generate the briefing text using the agent's own capabilities.

Quick reference:

# Invoke data gatherer (waits for completion)
"{baseDir}/skills/daily-briefing/bin/run_daily_briefing.sh"

# Read output
cat /tmp/daily_briefing_data.json

Output Contract (STRICT)

CRITICAL: Output only the briefing text. No prefaces, no explanations, no "Done", no file paths, no tool output, no markdown code fences around the briefing.

Line 1 Format (Required)

Line 1 must begin exactly with the time-appropriate greeting:

Good {time_of_day} - Today is {Weekday}, {Month} {D}, {YYYY}. {Skies sentence}.

• Use full month name (e.g., "February", not "Feb").
• If today is the user's birthday (matched by name in contacts): replace greeting with:

  🎉 Happy Birthday! Today is {Weekday}, {Month} {D}, {YYYY}. {Skies sentence}.
  

Greeting Selection (Local Time)

Skies Sentence Rules

If weather is usable:

{Conditions} skies, around {TEMP}°{time_clause}{low_clause}{precip_clause}.

• Use high temp if reliable → time clause: " this afternoon"
• Otherwise use current temp → time clause: " right now"
• If low exists: append , with a low around {LOW}°
• If precip chance ≥30%: append , and a {CHANCE}% chance of {rain/snow/precipitation}

If weather is not usable: Use exact fallback:

I can't access weather right now.

Layout Rules

{Line 1: Greeting with skies sentence}

{Birthdays section - only if any today or upcoming}

{Calendar events section - only if any}

{Reminders section - only if any}

{Important emails section - only if enabled and any}

{Anchors - only if real priorities from context}

{Closing line - always required}

• Always include a blank line after Line 1.
• Each section separated by a blank line if present.
• Target ~5–15 lines depending on enabled integrations.

Vibe and Tone

• Gentle gift for the day: warm, calm, compassionate, quietly hopeful.
• No scolding, no urgency, no productivity pressure.
• Telegram-friendly: short lines, roomy spacing, easy to skim.

System Skill Execution

Step 1: Check Mode (Interactive vs Cron)

If interactive AND missing critical info (location/timezone/units):

• Prompt briefly for missing info before generating briefing.
• Offer toggles for integrations.
• Mention the important emails feature: explain it uses AI-powered semantic analysis to surface actionable emails (transactions, shipments, security alerts, etc.) and can be enabled via emails.enabled in config; note iCloud Mail requires an app-specific password (emails.icloudPassword).

If non-interactive (cron/automation):

• Do NOT ask questions (cron-safe). Use defaults.
• Do NOT create/modify any files.
• Do NOT spawn background tasks/sub-agents.
• Omit weather if location is unavailable.

Step 2: Invoke the Data Gatherer

"{baseDir}/skills/daily-briefing/bin/run_daily_briefing.sh"

• The runner script executes scripts/daily_briefing_orchestrator.sh.
• TCC permissions are granted to Terminal.app (or the calling process).

Step 3: Read the Gathered Data

After the app completes, read:

/tmp/daily_briefing_data.json

JSON structure:

{
  "generated_at": "ISO timestamp",
  "system": {
    "timezone": "America/New_York",
    "local_time": "2024-02-03T08:30:00",
    "hour": 8
  },
  "config": {
    "location": "New York, NY",
    "units": "C",
    "birthdays_enabled": true,
    "birthdays_lookahead": 14,
    "calendar_google_enabled": true,
    "calendar_icloud_enabled": true,
    "calendar_lookahead": 0,
    "reminders_enabled": true,
    "reminders_due_filter": "today",
    "reminders_include_past_due": true,
    "emails_enabled": false,
    "emails_limit": 10,
    "emails_sort_newest": true,
    "emails_starred_first": true,
    "emails_unread_only": true
  },
  "birthdays": {
    "available": true,
    "user_birthday_today": false,
    "data": [
      {"name": "Jane Doe", "date": "2024-02-03", "days_until": 0},
      {"name": "John Smith", "date": "2024-02-05", "days_until": 2}
    ]
  },
  "calendar": {
    "available": true,
    "data": [
      {"title": "Team standup", "start": "09:00", "end": "09:30", "all_day": false, "date": "2024-02-03", "source": "google"},
      {"title": "Doctor appointment", "start": null, "end": null, "all_day": true, "date": "2024-02-03", "source": "icloud"}
    ]
  },
  "reminders": {
    "available": true,
    "data": [
      {"title": "Pick up prescription", "due": "2024-02-03"}
    ]
  },
  "emails": {
    "available": true,
    "data": [
      {"id": "abc123", "from": "Amazon", "from_email": "shipment@amazon.com", "subject": "Your order has shipped", "preview": "Your package is on its way...", "starred": false, "unread": true, "date": "2024-02-03T07:30:00Z", "source": "gmail"},
      {"id": "def456", "from": "Chase", "from_email": "alerts@chase.com", "subject": "Payment received", "preview": "We received your payment of...", "starred": true, "unread": true, "date": "2024-02-03T06:15:00Z", "source": "icloud"}
    ]
  },
  "contacts": {
    "available": true,
    "data": [
      {"name": "Jane Doe", "email": "jane@example.com"},
      {"name": "John Smith", "email": "john@example.com"}
    ]
  }
}

Step 4: Fetch Weather (Agent Task)

The agent must fetch weather directly using curl (not via orchestrator):

curl -fsSL --max-time 12 "https://wttr.in/{ENCODED_LOCATION}?format=j1"

• Location: Use config.location from gathered data; if empty/null, weather is unavailable.
• Retry: Retry once on failure.
• If still failing or unusable: Weather is unavailable; use fallback sentence.

Parse from JSON response:

• Conditions: current_condition[0].weatherDesc[0].value
• Current temp (C): current_condition[0].temp_C
• Current temp (F): current_condition[0].temp_F
• High temp (C): weather[0].maxtempC
• High temp (F): weather[0].maxtempF
• Low temp (C): weather[0].mintempC
• Low temp (F): weather[0].mintempF
• Precip chance: max of weather[0].hourly[*].chanceofrain (as integers)

Units: Use config.units ("C" or "F"). Default to Celsius if unknown.

CRITICAL: Do NOT output raw curl/tool output. Do NOT use wttr.in one-line formats.

Step 5: Classify Important Emails (Agent Task)

Only if config.emails_enabled is true and emails.available is true.

For each email in emails.data, use the agent's own semantic analysis to determine importance.

Important Email Criteria (any match qualifies):

• From contacts in the gathered contacts list
• Order shipment notifications
• Receipts for purchases or transaction confirmations
• Incoming/outgoing transaction alerts
• Refund-related messages
• Customer service interactions
• Upcoming subscription renewal notices
• Upcoming payment heads-up notices
• Technical newsletters
• Job application updates
• Messages from recruiters (exclude WITCH-like outsourcing firms)
• Banking alerts
• Calendar invites
• Account security emails (e.g., "your account is locked")
• Shared items (e.g., Google Drive shares)
• Wishlist-related alerts
• Starred/flagged emails (positive signal, not sole determinant)
• Any other contextually important emails

Exclusions: The following are never important, even if matching other criteria:

• Promotional/marketing emails
• LinkedIn Job Alert emails (LinkedIn message notifications are fine)
• Unsolicited recruiter/job-posting emails and mass hiring notices (e.g., subjects or bodies containing keywords like "hire", "hiring", "job", "position", "onsite", "fulltime", "recruiter", "application", or obvious bulk outreach), unless the sender is in the user's contacts or the message is starred/readily identified as personally relevant.
• Product announcement / product update emails and vendor/platform notifications (e.g., "[Product Update]", release announcements, automatic enablement notices), unless the sender is in the user's contacts or the message is explicitly starred.
• Vendor newsletters, community announcements, and general technical mailing-list posts (e.g., blog posts, release notes, product previews, digests), unless clearly personal or from a contact.

Failure behavior: If semantic analysis fails, silently omit the entire email section.

Apply filters and sorting:

1. Filter by emails_unread_only if true
2. If emails_starred_first is true, starred emails first
3. Sort by date per emails_sort_newest
4. Limit to emails_limit

Step 6: Generate the Briefing

Using all gathered and processed data, compose the briefing text following the Output Contract.

Section Formats:

Birthdays:

🎂 **Birthdays:**
• Today: Name
• Feb 5: Name

• Group multiples per date
• Today entries first
• Up to 5 upcoming (excluding today)

Calendar Events:

📅 **Today's schedule:**
• All-day: Event title
• 9:00 AM: Event title

• Single day: "Today's schedule"
• Multi-day: "Schedule" with "Today/Tomorrow/{Month} {D}" labels
• All-day events first, then timed by start
• Up to 3 events per day

Reminders:

✅ **Reminders:**
• Pick up prescription

• Due-today reminders only
• Up to 3 reminders

Important Emails:

📧 **Emails needing attention:**
• Amazon: Your order has shipped
• Chase: Payment received

• Format: • Sender: Subject (truncated if needed)

Anchors:

• Only if you can confidently infer 1–3 real priorities from user-provided context.
• Plain bullets, no heading.
• If not real/uncertain, omit entirely (do not invent).

Closing Line:

• Required. Use the quote field from the gathered JSON data.
• The orchestrator provides a random motivational quote each run.

Step 7: Output the Briefing

Return only the briefing text. Nothing else.

Configuration

Configuration is read from ~/.openclaw/openclaw.json at path skills.entries.daily-briefing.config:

{
  "skills": {
    "entries": {
      "daily-briefing": {
        "config": {
          "location": "New York, NY",
          "timezone": "America/New_York",
          "units": "C",
          "birthdays": {
            "enabled": true,
            "lookahead": 14,
            "sources": ["contacts", "google"]
          },
          "calendar": {
            "enabled": true,
            "lookahead": 0,
            "sources": ["google", "icloud"]
          },
          "reminders": {
            "enabled": true
          },
          "emails": {
            "enabled": false,
            "icloudPassword": "",
            "limit": 10,
            "sortNewest": true,
            "starredFirst": true,
            "unreadOnly": true
          }
        }
      }
    }
  }
}

Configuration Options

Defaults

• Timezone: User's local timezone; fallback to UTC if unknown.
• Location: User's location if present; omit weather if unavailable in cron mode.
• Units: User's preferred units if known; otherwise Celsius.

Dependencies

Required:

• curl — for weather fetching
• bash — for orchestrator script

Optional:

• gog — brew install steipete/tap/gogcli (Google Calendar, Gmail, Contacts)
• icalpal — brew install ajrosen/tap/icalpal (iCloud Calendar)
• himalaya — brew install himalaya (iCloud Mail via IMAP)

File Structure

daily-briefing/
├── SKILL.md
├── README.md
├── install.sh
├── scripts/
│   └── daily_briefing_orchestrator.sh
└── bin/
    └── run_daily_briefing.sh (created by install.sh)

Example Output

Good morning - Today is Saturday, February 3, 2024. Partly cloudy skies, around 45°F this afternoon, with a low around 32°F.

🎂 **Birthdays:**
• Today: Jane Doe
• Feb 5: John Smith

📅 **Today's schedule:**
• All-day: Doctor appointment
• 9:00 AM: Team standup

✅ **Reminders:**
• Pick up prescription

📧 **Emails needing attention:**
• Amazon: Your order has shipped
• Chase: Payment received

Take things one step at a time today—you've got this.

Cleanup

"{baseDir}/skills/daily-briefing/bin/run_daily_briefing.sh" --cleanup