Tell a digest how far back to look
When you ask a Bot to recap a Slack channel, a mailbox or a folder, say how far back to look. A request like "catch me up on the design channel" can send it through months of old threads. A request like "catch me up on the design channel since last Monday," or "only messages from the last seven days," keeps the run shorter and the list something you can actually read.
If the digest already runs on a schedule, point it at the previous run instead of guessing a date: "Only include items newer than your last run. On the first run, look back seven days." Then a Monday recap covers the week you missed, not the whole history of the channel.
To add a lookback to a routine you already have, click the Bot's name at the top of the chat, open the routine under Routines and choose Edit. Grok Bot starts a message that begins "Edit your routine:". Add your lookback sentence and send it. Then open the routine again and read the Instruction to make sure the line is there.
A few lines that work well:
- "Only include items from the last seven days."
- "Only include items newer than your last run. On the first run, look back seven days."
- "Ignore anything older than last Friday at 5 p.m."
Keep the window as short as the job allows. A longer window makes one run do more work, and the recap gets harder to scan. If a test run comes back with pages of old threads, shorten the window and test again. On desktop, open the routine and choose Test if it is available. A test does real work, so use it on a digest that only reads.
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