µTask

µTask is an open-source automation engine designed for cloud environments. It allows users to model business processes using a declarative YAML format, defining specific inputs and a graph of actions with their inter-dependencies. The software asynchronously handles the execution of these actions, managing transient errors and maintaining an encrypted, auditable trace of all intermediary states until the process reaches completion.

Deployed as a server application, µTask provides a graphical dashboard and an HTTP API for requesting, browsing, and monitoring tasks. It is typically run via Docker Compose or as a standalone binary. The system is designed to operate in a distributed manner where multiple instances coordinate through a shared database to execute workloads within a single runtime, meaning work is not delegated to external agents.

Key features

• Declarative workflow modeling using YAML files
• Custom action development using the Go language
• Data encryption for secure storage of task states
• Asynchronous execution with automatic handling of transient errors
• Integration with Slack, Opsgenie, and generic webhooks for notifications
• Support for human-in-the-loop investigation steps via generated forms
• Distributed coordination across multiple instances via Postgres
• API endpoints for task requests and template browsing

The architecture relies solely on a Postgres database (version 9.5 or higher) for state management and coordination. When an instance claims a task, it locks the process to prevent collisions, releasing it only after the execution cycle ends. This design ensures that if an instance fails or is interrupted, another active instance can collect and resume the task from its last state. The application is designed to be placed behind a reverse proxy for authentication, utilizing the x-remote-user header to identify authorized users for admin actions and task resolution.

It is intended for DevOps engineers and developers who need to automate complex sequences such as Kubernetes ingress TLS certificate provisioning, new team member bootstrapping, or asynchronous antifraud checks for payment APIs. By versioning task templates and plugins in a git repository, teams can maintain a consistent automation pipeline across their infrastructure.

µTask serves as a lightweight orchestration tool for executing structured, auditable business processes in cloud-native environments.