OpenClaw Maintenance Skill

OpenClaw is a self-hosted, open-source (MIT) gateway that routes AI agents across WhatsApp, Telegram, Discord, Slack, iMessage, Signal, and 15+ other channels simultaneously. It runs on macOS, Linux, or Windows.

Reference Files

Quick Reference

Key Paths

~/.openclaw/openclaw.json

~/.openclaw/.env

~/.openclaw/workspace

~/.openclaw/agents/<id>/

~/.openclaw/skills/

~/.openclaw/agents/<id>/qmd/

~/.openclaw/agents/<id>/agent/auth-profiles.json

OPENCLAW_CONFIG_PATH

OPENCLAW_STATE_DIR

OPENCLAW_HOME

Essential Commands

openclaw status                    # Overall status
openclaw gateway status            # Gateway daemon status
openclaw gateway status --deep     # Deep scan including system services
openclaw doctor                    # Diagnose config/service issues
openclaw doctor --fix              # Auto-fix safe issues
openclaw logs --follow             # Tail gateway logs
openclaw channels status --probe   # Channel health check
openclaw security audit            # Security posture check
openclaw security audit --fix      # Auto-fix security issues
openclaw update                    # Self-update
openclaw dashboard                 # Open Control UI in browser
openclaw tui                       # Terminal UI (interactive REPL)
openclaw agent                     # Direct agent interaction via CLI
openclaw health                    # Health check
openclaw usage                     # Usage tracking
openclaw config validate           # Validate config file
openclaw config file               # Print active config path
openclaw sessions cleanup          # Session disk cleanup
openclaw agents bindings           # Agent-channel bindings
openclaw agents bind               # Bind agent to account
openclaw agents unbind             # Unbind agent
openclaw update --dry-run          # Preview update
openclaw system presence           # View connected clients/nodes
openclaw system heartbeat last     # Last heartbeat info
openclaw system heartbeat now      # Trigger heartbeat immediately
openclaw memory search <query>     # CLI memory search
openclaw docs <query>              # Search OpenClaw docs
openclaw nodes pending             # List pending pairing requests
openclaw nodes approve <id>        # Approve node pairing
openclaw nodes status              # Show all paired nodes
openclaw health --json             # Full health snapshot (JSON)
openclaw message send --media <p>  # Send media message

Default Gateway

• Bind:

  127.0.0.1:18789

  (loopback)
• Dashboard:

  http://127.0.0.1:18789/

• Protocol: WebSocket (JSON text frames)

Core Workflow

Diagnosing Issues

Always follow this command ladder:

1. openclaw status

   — quick overview

2. openclaw gateway status

   — daemon running? RPC probe ok?

3. openclaw logs --follow

   — watch for errors

4. openclaw doctor

   — config/service diagnostics

5. openclaw channels status --probe

   — per-channel health

Starting / Restarting Gateway

# Foreground with verbose logging
openclaw gateway --port 18789 --verbose

# Force-kill existing listener then start
openclaw gateway --force

# Service management (launchd on macOS, systemd on Linux)
openclaw gateway install
openclaw gateway start
openclaw gateway stop
openclaw gateway restart

Configuration

Edit config via any method:

# Interactive wizard
openclaw onboard                    # Full setup
openclaw configure                  # Config wizard

# CLI one-liners
openclaw config get <path>          # Read value
openclaw config set <path> <value>  # Set value (JSON5 or raw string)
openclaw config unset <path>        # Remove value

# Direct edit
# Edit ~/.openclaw/openclaw.json (JSON5 format)
# Gateway hot-reloads on save (if gateway.reload.mode != "off")

Minimal config example:

{
  agents: { defaults: { workspace: "~/.openclaw/workspace" } },
  channels: { whatsapp: { allowFrom: ["+15555550123"] } },
}

Channel Setup

For detailed per-channel setup, see references/channels.md. For per-channel troubleshooting (failure signatures, setup walkthroughs), see references/channel_troubleshooting.md. For plugins adding new channels (Matrix, Nostr, MS Teams, etc.), see references/plugins.md.

Quick channel add:

# Interactive wizard
openclaw channels add

# Non-interactive
openclaw channels add --channel telegram --account default --name "My Bot" --token $BOT_TOKEN
openclaw channels login --channel whatsapp     # QR pairing for WhatsApp
openclaw channels status --probe               # Verify

Model Provider Setup

For detailed provider setup, see references/providers.md.

# Set default model
openclaw models set anthropic/claude-sonnet-4-5

# List available models
openclaw models list --all

# Check auth/token status
openclaw models status --probe

# Add auth interactively
openclaw models auth add

Config example:

{
  agents: {
    defaults: {
      model: {
        primary: "anthropic/claude-sonnet-4-5",
        fallbacks: ["openai/gpt-5.2"],
      },
    },
  },
}

Multi-Agent Routing

For detailed multi-agent config, see references/multi_agent.md.

openclaw agents add <id>                # Create agent
openclaw agents list --bindings         # Show agent-channel bindings
openclaw agents delete <id>             # Remove agent

Nodes (iOS / Android / macOS / Headless)

For detailed node setup, see references/nodes.md.

openclaw nodes status                   # List connected nodes
openclaw nodes describe --node <id>     # Node capabilities
openclaw devices list                   # Pending device approvals
openclaw devices approve <requestId>    # Approve a device
openclaw node run --host <host> --port 18789  # Start headless node host

Security

For detailed security hardening, see references/security.md. For secrets management (SecretRef, vault integration), see references/secrets.md. For sandboxing (Docker isolation for tools), see references/sandboxing.md. For full config field reference, see references/config_reference.md. For remote access (SSH, Tailscale, VPN), see references/remote_access.md.

openclaw security audit                 # Check posture
openclaw security audit --deep          # Live gateway probe
openclaw security audit --fix           # Auto-fix safe issues
openclaw secrets reload                 # Re-resolve secret refs
openclaw secrets audit                  # Scan for plaintext leaks

Update / Uninstall

For detailed installation, updating, rollback, and migration guide, see references/install.md.

# Install (recommended)
curl -fsSL https://openclaw.ai/install.sh | bash

# Update
openclaw update                    # Self-update command
# Or: npm install -g openclaw@latest
openclaw doctor                    # Run after update to apply migrations

# Uninstall
openclaw uninstall

Tools Reference

For detailed per-tool documentation, see references/tools.md.

For specific tools, see:

• references/exec.md — Exec tool deep-dive
• references/exec_approvals.md — Exec approvals and allowlists
• references/browser.md — Browser automation deep-dive
• references/web_tools.md — Web search/fetch with multiple providers
• references/lobster.md — Lobster workflow runtime
• references/llm_task.md — LLM Task for structured JSON output
• references/openprose.md — OpenProse multi-agent programs
• references/plugins.md — Plugin system (install, author, distribute)
• references/skills.md — Skills system (load, config, ClawHub)

For ACP agents (Codex, Claude Code, Gemini CLI, etc.), see references/acp_agents.md. For Diffs plugin and Firecrawl anti-bot fallback, see references/diffs_firecrawl.md. For chat slash commands (/new, /model, /acp, etc.), see references/slash_commands.md. For thinking levels (/think, /verbose, /reasoning), see references/thinking.md. For polls (Telegram, WhatsApp, Discord, MS Teams), see references/polls.md. For Talk Mode and Voice Wake, see references/voice.md. For Gateway architecture and wire protocol, see references/architecture.md. For agent runtime and loop details, see references/agent_runtime.md. For command queue system, see references/queue.md. For model failover and OAuth, see references/model_failover.md. For ClawHub skill registry, see references/clawhub.md. For presence and discovery, see references/presence_discovery.md. For streaming and chunking, see references/streaming.md. For Gateway internals (network model, lock, health, doctor, logging), see references/gateway_internals.md. For heartbeat system, see references/heartbeat.md. For Bonjour/mDNS discovery details, see references/bonjour.md. For Gateway node pairing, see references/pairing.md. For Terminal UI (TUI), see references/tui.md. For media (camera, images, audio), see references/media.md. For channel routing and session keys, see references/channel_routing.md.

Tool profiles:

minimal

coding

messaging

full

Tool groups (for allow/deny):

• group:runtime

  — exec, bash, process

• group:fs

  — read, write, edit, apply_patch

• group:sessions

  — sessions_list/history/send/spawn, session_status

• group:memory

  — memory_search, memory_get

• group:web

  — web_search, web_fetch

• group:ui

  — browser, canvas

• group:automation

  — cron, gateway

• group:messaging

  — message

• group:nodes

  — nodes

• group:openclaw

  — all built-in OpenClaw tools (excludes provider plugins)

Common Failure Signatures

refusing to bind gateway ... without auth

gateway.auth.token

gateway.auth.password

another gateway instance is already listening

EADDRINUSE

openclaw gateway --force

Gateway start blocked: set gateway.mode=local

gateway.mode="local"

unauthorized

OPENCLAW_GATEWAY_TOKEN

device identity required

openclaw pairing list

Embedding provider authentication failed (401)

.env

your-jina-api-key-here

~/.openclaw/.env

config change requires gateway restart (plugins.*)

openclaw gateway restart

launchctl kickstart -k

Bootstrap failed: 5: Input/output error

openclaw gateway install

launchctl kickstart -k gui/$(id -u)/ai.openclaw.gateway

Missing env var "X" referenced at config path: ...

.env

~/.openclaw/.env

Environment Variables

OPENCLAW_GATEWAY_TOKEN

OPENCLAW_GATEWAY_PASSWORD

OPENCLAW_GATEWAY_PORT

OPENCLAW_CONFIG_PATH

OPENCLAW_STATE_DIR

OPENCLAW_HOME

OPENCLAW_LOAD_SHELL_ENV

1

OPENCLAW_VERBOSE

OPENCLAW_LOG_FILE

OPENCLAW_LOG_LEVEL

OPENCLAW_SHELL

BRAVE_API_KEY

FIRECRAWL_API_KEY

ELEVENLABS_API_KEY

ELEVENLABS_VOICE_ID

CLAWHUB_TOKEN

CLAWHUB_WORKDIR

OLLAMA_API_KEY