5 critical tasks to monitor with Mortemain (and why)

When a scheduled job stops without a word, the fallout is real: lost data, blocked workflows, an expired certificate taking a site down. None of it errors, so your dashboard stays green. A Mortemain check-in turns each one into an alert. Start with these.

1. Backups

A backup that isn't running means unprotected data, and you find out during a restore, too late. Ping on success at the end of the job:

rsync -avz /data/ backup:/backups/data/ && curl -fsS -m 10 https://ping.mortemain.com/your-uuid

Per tool: pg_dump · restic · Borg · all backups

2. Cron jobs

Log cleanup, cache refreshes, scheduled emails. Drop one by accident or let it die quietly and nobody notices. Add the ping to the crontab line:

0 3 * * * /usr/local/bin/report.sh && curl -fsS -m 10 https://ping.mortemain.com/your-uuid

See the cron guide and the 3-step walkthrough.

3. CI/CD pipelines

A pipeline that fails blocks deploys. One that never triggers is invisible to your CI tool. A final step that always runs closes the gap:

- name: Notify Mortemain
  if: always()   # even on failure
  run: curl -fsS -m 10 https://ping.mortemain.com/your-uuid

Per tool: GitHub Actions · GitLab CI · Jenkins

4. Data syncs (ETL, Airflow)

A sync that stops leaves your systems quietly out of step. Ping at the end of the script:

import requests
requests.get("https://ping.mortemain.com/your-uuid", timeout=10)

Per tool: Python · Airflow · Prefect · Dagster

5. Certificate renewal

An expired certificate takes the whole site down, and classic monitors don't always catch a failed renewal. Report success, or /fail if the renewal errors:

certbot renew --quiet && curl -fsS -m 10 https://ping.mortemain.com/your-uuid \
  || curl -fsS -m 10 https://ping.mortemain.com/your-uuid/fail

Which to monitor first

Prioritise the jobs that:

• have no redundancy, so nothing takes over if they stop;
• are business-critical (backups, payments, billing);
• run unattended, with no human watching (cron, CI/CD);
• can fail silently, with no logs and no error.

Pick one, add its check-in, then simulate a failure to confirm the alert lands. Try Mortemain free (20 checks, no credit card).