gmhb-canary

Retrieve Growth Management Hearings Board orders from the Washington ELUHO CMS using R and direct HTTP. Write a UTF-8 CSV and optionally send a readable SMTP notification. The default window is the previous complete week (Monday-Sunday).

Run

Requires R >= 4.1, httr2, jsonlite, curl, and xml2.

packages <- c("httr2", "jsonlite", "curl", "xml2")
missing <- packages[!vapply(packages, requireNamespace, logical(1), quietly = TRUE)]
if (length(missing)) {
  install.packages(missing)
}

Default retrieves the previous calendar week (as determined by today's date in America/Los_Angeles timezone):

Rscript scripts/query_orders.R

This exports CSV only. To also send the weekly report by email:

Rscript scripts/query_orders.R --email

For example, a run on Tuesday, October 6, 2026 retrieves September 28 through October 4, with October 5 as the exclusive end date. Order filtering uses CMS UTC dates.

To specify the query range explicitly:

Rscript scripts/query_orders.R --since 2026-09-01 --before 2026-10-01

CSV files go into ignored results/, with dates in the filename. Repeating the same command replaces that output. --output path/to/orders.csv overrides the destination. The script and local package library are located relative to the script, so execution does not depend on the working directory. An explicit relative output path is relative to the working directory.

The CSV preserves returned Salesforce column names, identifiers, UTC timestamps, and Case_Link__c HTML. Case links are preserved as supplied; no HTML is executed.

Zero results produce a header-only CSV and exit 0. Network, HTTP, API-contract, or output failures produce an error on stderr and exit 1. Do not consume an old CSV after a failed run; always check the process exit status.

Since it would be rare for the Board to make more decisions in one week than fit on a single CMS results page, the script exports up to 50 records and will indicate REVIEW REQUIRED if 50 or more were returned. Check the CMS manually for additional orders.

SMTP email

Set these variables in a private .Renviron file. This keeps passwords out of scripts, command arguments, and version control.

Variable	Meaning
SMTP	Relay hostname; optional smtp:// or smtps:// scheme
SMTPPORT	Port number, stored separately from the hostname
MAILER_EMAIL	Sender address and SMTP authentication username
MAILER_PW	SMTP password
MYEMAIL	Recipient address; multiple addresses may be comma/semicolon separated
GMHB_LOG_FILE	Optional log path; defaults to logs/gmhb-canary.log in the project

The implementation uses curl's SMTP transport with verbose logging disabled and 15-second connection/60-second total timeouts. There is no dependency on Outlook or an interactive email login.

To preview the email without loading SMTP settings or sending anything:

Rscript --vanilla scripts/query_orders.R --preview-email

This queries the CMS and writes .html and .txt previews alongside the CSV.

The normal email contains both plain text and HTML, with order titles, dates, types, docket entries, clickable case names, and the Order Search link. CMS markup is parsed as data and escaped, not copied into the email. There are no attachments or unverified document URLs.

• Zero selected orders: no email
• Successful delivery: EMAIL_ACCEPTED means the relay accepted the message, not that inbox delivery has been confirmed.
• CMS or export/formatting failure: attempt one failure email if SMTP configuration was successfully loaded; the run still exits 1.
• SMTP failure: log the failure and exit 1. Do not automatically retry because the message might already have been accepted. The same relay cannot reliably alert about its own failure; inspect the log and Task Scheduler result.
• Configuration/startup failure: exit 1; a failure email may not be possible.

Windows Task Scheduler

1. Create a task with a weekly trigger on Monday afternoon at a time the user is normally logged in. The default window covers the previous Monday-Sunday week.
2. Action: Start a program. Program is the full path to Rscript.exe, for example C:\Program Files\R\R-4.6.1\bin\x64\Rscript.exe.
3. Arguments: Full path to query_orders.R followed by --email, for example "C:\projects\gmhb-canary\scripts\query_orders.R" --email. Without --email, the task only exports CSV and logs EMAIL_DISABLED.
4. Set Start in to the project directory. The script uses absolute project paths internally, so that working directory is not required for file lookup.
5. In Settings, enable running a missed task as soon as possible and choose Do not start a new instance when the task is already running. Do not enable automatic restart on failure; inspect the log before resending.
6. Allow enough time for the two CMS requests and SMTP delivery (for example a five-minute execution limit). The computer must be awake, logged in, and able to reach both the CMS and relay.

No scheduled task is created by this repository. Test it manually under the intended account and confirm the email arrives before enabling the trigger. Check logs/gmhb-canary.log and Task Scheduler's Last Run Result. Log events use UTC timestamps and record counts/stages without credentials or raw server replies.

A delayed task uses the previous week relative to its actual execution date. If an entire week is missed, rerun the missing week with explicit --since and --before arguments. Late-posted or backdated orders would require a manual rerun.