# Custom Automations
Create and manage Factory automations that run workflows across your software delivery lifecycle.
Automations turn Droid into a teammate for repeatable engineering work. They run from schedules, Slack messages, or GitHub events, covering code review, QA, AutoWiki, security audits, triage, incident response, Slack intake, and scheduled checks.
## What Automations are
An automation has:
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- **A trigger**: when it starts.
- **Instructions**: the prompt that's delegated to Droid.
- **A run target**: where Droid runs, such as a computer, Slack channel, or GitHub workflow.
- **Visibility**: who can view or manage it.
### When to use Automations
Use Automations when a workflow should run repeatedly, start from an event, or be shared with a team instead of handled manually each time.
## How to use Automations
### View your automations
Open All Automations under **Software Factory** in the Factory App sidebar. From the list, you can:
- Search by title, description, or SDLC stage.
- Switch between **Private** and **Shared**.
- Filter by trigger type: **Scheduled**, **Slack**, or **GitHub**.
- See owner, status, run target, and SDLC stage.
### Create a new automation
Click **New automation**, then choose a template. Software Factory templates map to SDLC stages, while custom templates give you flexible starting points for your own triggers and workflows.
#### Software Factory templates
Use these templates to add automation to specific SDLC stages in Software Factory.
| Template | Use it for |
| --- | --- |
| **Code Review** | Review pull requests automatically. |
| **QA** | Generate and run QA checks. |
| **AutoWiki** | Refresh repository documentation. |
| **Security Audit** | Run scheduled deep security reviews. |
| **Triage** | Scan intake sources and route work. |
| **Incident Response** | Investigate alerts from Slack channels. |
#### Custom templates
Use these templates to create automations around your own channels, schedules, and GitHub events.
| Template | Use it for |
| --- | --- |
| **Slack** | Trigger Droid sessions from Slack messages. |
| **Scheduled** | Run a prompt on a recurring schedule. |
| **GitHub** | Run Droid from custom GitHub workflow events. |
### Configure triggers
After you select a template, Factory tailors setup to the trigger and destination.
| Trigger type | What you configure |
| --- | --- |
| **Scheduled** | Schedule, prompt, run target, model, and optional working directory. |
| **Slack** | Channels, message source, prompt, run target, privacy, keywords, and model. |
| **GitHub** | Repositories, events, workflow settings, and template-specific options. |
### Manage an automation
Select an automation row to open its detail view. Depending on the trigger type and your permissions, you can run now, pause, resume, share, fork, rename, edit, or delete the automation.
## Automation settings
Use automation settings to control what starts the run, where it executes, who owns it, and how results are tracked.
| Setting area | Options | What it controls |
| :----------- | :------ | :--------------- |
| Trigger type | Scheduled, Slack, GitHub | What starts the automation and what event context Droid receives. |
| Scheduled trigger | Natural-language cadence or cron schedule | When a recurring prompt runs. |
| Slack trigger | Channels, message source, keywords, privacy, and prompt | Which Slack messages start sessions and how they are scoped. |
| GitHub trigger | Repositories, events, workflow settings, and template options | Which repository events, such as pull requests, pushes, comments, labels, or checks, start the automation. |
| Run target | Run as, run on, working directory, and model | The user or service account, Droid Computer, repo path, and model used for execution. |
| Visibility | Private or shared | Whether only the owner or the organization can see the automation. |
| Ownership actions | Run now, pause, resume, share, fork, rename, edit, or delete | What owners can do from the automation detail view. Non-owners can fork shared automations when they need a copy. |
| Run history | Recent runs, statuses, and generated dashboard output | How teams inspect automation results over time. |
For shared team workflows, use [service accounts](/enterprise/identity-and-access#service-accounts) and [Droid Computers](/droid-computers/overview) to keep runs on a stable identity and environment.
Add end-to-end QA as a Software Factory automation.
See automation coverage and stage health in one dashboard.