Developer solves job queue overflow by splitting tasks across daily time slots

A developer managing 20 automated websites discovered that a deterministic job scheduler consistently left tasks unfinished, with 19 due tasks per run but capacity for only 12. Reordering tasks by priority failed to resolve the problem, as sorting only changes which tasks are dropped, not how many. The solution was dividing each day into four named time slots and assigning each task to specific slots within the configuration file. A key implementation detail preserved the original reason a task was due, preventing log ambiguity when tasks were deferred rather than broken. A secondary fix replaced a date-based miss counter with a per-run ledger, closing a blind spot where tasks skipped at night appeared fully handled due to a morning run on the same date.