Trigger-Action Agent Patterns
Event detection → decision → action: the core automation loop.
What Is a Trigger-Action Agent?
A trigger-action agent watches for events and responds with actions. The three-part loop is: detect event → LLM decides action → execute action.
Examples: email received → summarize and reply; file uploaded → validate and process; 9am every day → generate daily report.
Types of Triggers
Triggers fall into three categories:
- Event-based: webhook fires when email arrives or file uploads
- Time-based: cron schedule runs agent at fixed intervals
- Polling-based: agent checks an API repeatedly for new data
Choosing the right trigger type determines your agent's latency and resource usage.
All lessons in this course
- Trigger-Action Agent Patterns
- Connecting Agents to Webhooks
- Scheduling and Cron-Based Agents
- Building a Multi-App Automation Pipeline