Dispatch · once per computer · 5 min read

The Cortex sync

Amazon gives DSPs no data connection. There is no API to call, and the pages that hold your routes sign every request, so no server can fetch them. But the pages work perfectly well inside a browser that is already signed in — so the sync is a small Chrome extension that rides along in your dispatcher’s own Cortex session and copies what Amazon has already shown them.

Installing it

Add the extension from the Chrome Web Store.
Chrome Web StoreAdd OpsBrio — Cortex sync to Chrome
It is published unlisted — not searchable, reachable only by this link. Installing from the store is what makes updates arrive on their own.
In the same Chrome, sign in to your portal and to Amazon Logistics.
Both in ordinary tabs, as you normally would. The extension reads the Cortex session that is already there.
Open the extension’s popup and type your portal’s address once.
The field says Your company’s portal address — the address your portal opens at. Press Connect to the portal. Chrome asks once for permission to let the sync reach that address; that is the grant, and it is per address.
Check the icon says Connected.
If it does not, the popup says why in a sentence rather than a code. The first Connect also reads your company’s Amazon id and each station’s service-area id from Cortex and hands them to the portal, so nobody types either.
Leave a Cortex tab open on the machine that runs it.
Each kind of data has its own pace — routes through the day, the roster and the fleet daily, the scorecard weekly. The popup lists every stream and when each was last read, so a stream that has gone quiet is visible rather than assumed.

What it brings in

Routes and the itinerary: Which routes are confirmed, who Amazon has against each one, planned departures and the wave each belongs to.
Route demand: From Cortex Scheduling, so you can see what next week needs a week out rather than on the morning.
The roster: Active, inactive and offboarded drivers, with transporter ids — which is what lets a name match survive a middle name Amazon does not print.
The fleet: Every van Amazon has against your DSP, its status and which station it serves.
Vehicle checks: Each DVIC with its start and end, so you can see the ones that were finished too fast to be real.
Clocked hours: Real punch times and breaks from Amazon’s compliance dashboard — not an estimate, and not from your payroll provider.
The scorecard: The weekly scorecard and the deep dives behind it, including customer feedback and the deliveries marked not received.
Birthdays and awards: So the milestone is on a screen before somebody has to remember it.

All of it is an overlay. Your portal is the system of record and the sync only ever adds Amazon’s view beside yours — it never overwrites a van’s name, its station, a driver’s employment status or anything else you have decided. Where the two disagree, the screen shows both and offers you the press. If the sync breaks, your operation keeps running.

What is new comes in by itself. A driver Amazon makes active, or a van Amazon lists at one of your stations, is added on the next read — the driver at the station Amazon lists them under, the van under Amazon’s name. Nobody is added twice: a name Amazon prints with a middle name finds the record you already have, and anyone the sync is not sure of waits on People › Review for your press.

Full sync now: Everything your job covers, ignoring each stream’s usual pace — a few minutes. The one to press on the first run and after a long gap.
Routes sync only: Today’s routes onto the board and nothing else, for a login that can edit Dispatch. The one to press when a dispatcher is waiting on a change Amazon has just made.
Hiring sync only: Book Training, onboarding and — from version 1.0.16 — the drug tests, nothing else, for a login that can edit Hiring. From version 1.0.10.

Each login brings in what its own job covers, so a dispatcher’s Chrome and an HR manager’s Chrome sync different things — which is why everybody who runs a part of the office adds the extension in their own Chrome.

When something looks stale

Read the popup first — it lists each stream with the time it was last read, so the question is usually already answered there. The three ordinary causes, in the order they are worth checking:

Amazon’s session has expired. Open Cortex in that Chrome and sign in. The extension picks up again on its own.
The machine is asleep or Chrome is closed. The sync only runs while that browser is running. If the dispatcher’s laptop goes home at six, so does the sync.
Amazon has not published it yet. Route demand for next week appears when Amazon confirms it, not when you look. A day with nothing to read is recorded as “we asked and there was nothing”, which is deliberately not the same as never having asked — and a count you typed by hand is never overwritten by silence.

Before thisRecords, and how long they are kept NextWhere the week is made

Installing it

Add the extension from the Chrome Web Store.

Chrome Web StoreAdd OpsBrio — Cortex sync to Chrome

It is published unlisted — not searchable, reachable only by this link. Installing from the store is what makes updates arrive on their own.

In the same Chrome, sign in to your portal and to Amazon Logistics.

Both in ordinary tabs, as you normally would. The extension reads the Cortex session that is already there.

Open the extension’s popup and type your portal’s address once.

The field says Your company’s portal address — the address your portal opens at. Press Connect to the portal. Chrome asks once for permission to let the sync reach that address; that is the grant, and it is per address.

Check the icon says Connected.

If it does not, the popup says why in a sentence rather than a code. The first Connect also reads your company’s Amazon id and each station’s service-area id from Cortex and hands them to the portal, so nobody types either.

Leave a Cortex tab open on the machine that runs it.

Each kind of data has its own pace — routes through the day, the roster and the fleet daily, the scorecard weekly. The popup lists every stream and when each was last read, so a stream that has gone quiet is visible rather than assumed.

What it brings in

Routes and the itinerary

Which routes are confirmed, who Amazon has against each one, planned departures and the wave each belongs to.

Route demand

From Cortex Scheduling, so you can see what next week needs a week out rather than on the morning.

The roster

Active, inactive and offboarded drivers, with transporter ids — which is what lets a name match survive a middle name Amazon does not print.

The fleet

Every van Amazon has against your DSP, its status and which station it serves.

Vehicle checks

Each DVIC with its start and end, so you can see the ones that were finished too fast to be real.

Clocked hours

Real punch times and breaks from Amazon’s compliance dashboard — not an estimate, and not from your payroll provider.

The scorecard

The weekly scorecard and the deep dives behind it, including customer feedback and the deliveries marked not received.

Birthdays and awards

So the milestone is on a screen before somebody has to remember it.

The buttons in the popup

Full sync now

Everything your job covers, ignoring each stream’s usual pace — a few minutes. The one to press on the first run and after a long gap.

Routes sync only

Today’s routes onto the board and nothing else, for a login that can edit Dispatch. The one to press when a dispatcher is waiting on a change Amazon has just made.

Hiring sync only

Book Training, onboarding and — from version 1.0.16 — the drug tests, nothing else, for a login that can edit Hiring. From version 1.0.10.

When something looks stale

Read the popup first — it lists each stream with the time it was last read, so the question is usually already answered there. The three ordinary causes, in the order they are worth checking:

Amazon’s session has expired. Open Cortex in that Chrome and sign in. The extension picks up again on its own.

The machine is asleep or Chrome is closed. The sync only runs while that browser is running. If the dispatcher’s laptop goes home at six, so does the sync.

Amazon has not published it yet. Route demand for next week appears when Amazon confirms it, not when you look. A day with nothing to read is recorded as “we asked and there was nothing”, which is deliberately not the same as never having asked — and a count you typed by hand is never overwritten by silence.