[Bug]: Embedded agent failed before reply: Context engine "clawmem" is not registered. Available engines: legacy

[withx]

What happened?

clawmem is not registered. Available engines: legacy

Steps to reproduce

Install clawmem as:

#-install bun
curl -fsSL https://bun.sh/install | bash
#-install clawmem
npm install -g clawmem
#-One command: init + index + embed + hooks + MCP
mkdir ~/notes
clawmem bootstrap ~/notes --name notes

Verify

clawmem doctor

Setup Openclaw

clawmem setup openclaw
#run serve
clawmem serve &

#openclaw.conf
"entries": {
"clawmem": {
"enabled": true
}，
"slots": {
"contextEngine": "clawmem"
}

Error output / logs

#in OpenClaw chat 
 #journalctl --user -u openclaw-gateway -f
OpenClaw node[3120]: (Use `node --trace-deprecation ...` to show where the warning was created)
OpenClaw node[3120]: │
OpenClaw node[3120]: ◇  Config warnings ────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮
OpenClaw node[3120]: │                                                                      │
OpenClaw node[3120]: │  - plugins.entries.clawmem: plugin not found: clawmem (stale config  │
OpenClaw node[3120]: │    entry ignored; remove it from plugins config)                     │
OpenClaw node[3120]: │                                                                      │
OpenClaw node[3120]: ├──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯

 OpenClaw node[2832]: 2026-04-11T15:05:59.807+09:00 Embedded agent failed before reply: Context engine

Environment

• OS:ubuntu 22.04
• Bun version (bun --version):1.3.12
• ClawMem version: 0.8.3
• GPU (if applicable): NVIDIA TITAN RTX /Driver Version: 591.86 CUDA Version: 13.1
• llama-server version (if applicable): 0.20.2
  OpenClaw 2026.4.9 (0512059)

Component

CLI

Checklist

• I searched existing issues and this hasn't been reported
• I ran clawmem doctor and included relevant output above

[konradre]

Thanks for the report, @withx. Two separate problems here.

1. Plugin discovery (the main issue)

clawmem setup openclaw prints the installation steps but doesn't actually run them. OpenClaw never found your plugin files, which is why you're seeing "plugin not found: clawmem."

First, find where npm put ClawMem:

npm list -g clawmem

That gives you the install root. The plugin files live at <that-path>/node_modules/clawmem/src/openclaw/. Confirm they exist:

ls $(npm root -g)/clawmem/src/openclaw/
# should show: engine.ts  index.ts  plugin.json  shell.ts  tools.ts

Then run these steps (these are what clawmem setup openclaw tells you to do manually):

# 1. Create the extensions directory if it doesn't exist
mkdir -p ~/.openclaw/extensions

# 2. Symlink the plugin source into OpenClaw's plugin scan path
ln -s $(npm root -g)/clawmem/src/openclaw ~/.openclaw/extensions/clawmem

# 3. Copy the manifest with the filename OpenClaw expects
cp ~/.openclaw/extensions/clawmem/plugin.json ~/.openclaw/extensions/clawmem/openclaw.plugin.json

# 4. Set ClawMem as the active context engine
openclaw config set plugins.slots.contextEngine clawmem

# 5. Restart the gateway
openclaw gateway restart

After restart, verify OpenClaw found it:

openclaw plugins list | grep clawmem

We should make setup openclaw do this automatically instead of printing instructions. That's a UX gap on our end, and we'll fix it in a future release.

2. OpenClaw version

You're on v2026.4.9, which has a config normalization bug where plugins.slots.contextEngine gets silently dropped during processing. Even after you fix the symlink, this bug can cause the plugin to not activate.

The fix landed in OpenClaw v2026.4.10 (openclaw/openclaw#64192). Upgrade before testing:

sudo npm i -g openclaw@latest

We pushed docs improvements in 8a862c9 that cover both of these issues, including the version requirement. The OpenClaw plugin guide now calls out v2026.4.10+ as the recommended minimum.

Let us know if you hit anything else after both fixes are in place.

[konradre]

v0.8.4 is on npm and fixes this directly.

The root cause was that clawmem setup openclaw only printed manual instructions without actually installing anything. If any step was missed or misordered, OpenClaw couldn't find the plugin files.

What changed in v0.8.4:

• clawmem setup openclaw now auto-creates the symlink at ~/.openclaw/extensions/clawmem. No more manual symlink or manifest copy.
• The manifest shipped as plugin.json but OpenClaw expects openclaw.plugin.json. Renamed in the package, so the symlink exposes the right filename without a copy step.
• Setup detects and replaces stale symlinks (after npm updates, the old symlink target no longer exists). Idempotent on re-run.
• --remove actually removes the symlink and resets the config slot.
• The printed next steps now enforce restart-before-slot-config ordering, which was part of your original failure path.
• Setup warns about the OpenClaw < v2026.4.10 config normalization bug (fix(plugins): preserve contextEngine slot through config normalization openclaw/openclaw#64192) that silently drops plugins.slots.contextEngine.

To upgrade:

npm update -g clawmem
clawmem setup openclaw

Then follow the 4 printed steps (restart gateway, set slot, configure GPU endpoints if needed, start REST API).

Full changelog is in RELEASE_NOTES.md.

Can you confirm this resolves it on your setup? If you're still on OpenClaw v2026.4.9, upgrading OpenClaw to v2026.4.10+ would also help with the slot normalization issue we flagged in the earlier comment.

[withx]

thanks for help

I'm Reinstalled wsl ubuntu system and openclaw v2026.4.11
and then installed clawmem stepbystep...

kang@SH260401:~$ curl -fsSL https://openclaw.ai/install.sh | bash

🦞 OpenClaw Installer
Works on Android. Crazy concept, we know.

✓ Detected: linux

Install plan
OS: linux
Install method: npm
Requested version: latest

[1/3] Preparing environment
· Node.js not found, installing it now
· Installing Node.js via NodeSource
· Installing Linux build tools (make/g++/cmake/python3)
✓ Build tools installed
✓ Node.js v22 installed
· Active Node.js: v22.22.2 (/usr/bin/node)
· Active npm: 10.9.7 (/usr/bin/npm)

[2/3] Installing OpenClaw
✓ Git already installed
· Configuring npm for user-local installs
✓ npm configured for user installs
· Installing OpenClaw v2026.4.11
✓ OpenClaw npm package installed
✓ OpenClaw installed

[3/3] Finalizing setup

! PATH missing npm global bin dir: /home/kang/.npm-global/bin
This can make openclaw show as "command not found" in new terminals.
Fix (zsh: ~/.zshrc, bash: ~/.bashrc):
export PATH="/home/kang/.npm-global/bin:$PATH"

kang@SH260401:~$ npm install -g clawmem

added 223 packages in 41s

71 packages are looking for funding
run npm fund for details
kang@SH260401:~$ mkdir /notes
kang@SH260401:$ clawmem bootstrap ~/notes --name notes

Step 1: Initializing ClawMem
ClawMem initialized
Database: /home/kang/.cache/clawmem/index.sqlite
Config: /home/kang/.config/clawmem/index.yml

Next steps:
clawmem collection add ~/notes --name notes
clawmem update
clawmem embed
Step 2: Adding collection 'notes'
Added /home/kang/notes
Step 3: Indexing files
Indexing notes (/home/kang/notes)
+0 added, ~0 updated, =0 unchanged, -0 removed

Run clawmem embed to generate embeddings for new content
Profile auto-rebuilt (stale)
Step 4: Embedding documents
Embedding 1 documents (1 fragments total)...
Using remote GPU embedding: http://localhost:8088
[1/1] profile.md (1 frags, 74 chars)
[embed] Remote embed error: 771 | if (this.isRemoteEmbedDown()) return null;
772 | const input = this.truncateForEmbed(text);
773 | for (let attempt = 0; attempt < retries; attempt++) {
774 | try {
775 | const body: Record<string, unknown> = { input, model: this.remoteEmbedModel, ...extraParams };
776 | const resp = await fetch(${this.remoteEmbedUrl}/v1/embeddings, {
^
error: Unable to connect. Is the computer able to access the url?
path: "http://localhost:8088/v1/embeddings",
errno: 0,
code: "ConnectionRefused"

  at async embedRemote (/home/kang/.npm-global/lib/node_modules/clawmem/src/llm.ts:776:28)
  at async embed (/home/kang/.npm-global/lib/node_modules/clawmem/src/llm.ts:574:33)
  at async cmdEmbed (/home/kang/.npm-global/lib/node_modules/clawmem/src/clawmem.ts:531:36)
  at async cmdBootstrap (/home/kang/.npm-global/lib/node_modules/clawmem/src/clawmem.ts:1794:11)
  at async main (/home/kang/.npm-global/lib/node_modules/clawmem/src/clawmem.ts:2080:15)

Downloading to ~/.cache/qmd/models
✔ hf_ggml-org_embeddinggemma-300M-Q8_0.gguf downloaded 328.58MB in 40s
Downloaded to ~/.cache/qmd/models/hf_ggml-org_embeddinggemma-300M-Q8_0.gguf
frag 1/1 (full) 43813ms [102 chars]
→ doc done in 43.9s | 1/1 docs, 1 frags, 0 fails [44s elapsed]

Embedded 1 documents (1 fragments, 0 failed) in 43.9s
Step 5: Installing hooks
Installed ClawMem hooks to /home/kang/.claude/settings.json
UserPromptSubmit: context-surfacing
SessionStart: postcompact-inject, curator-nudge
PreCompact: precompact-extract
Stop: decision-extractor, handoff-generator, feedback-loop
Step 6: Registering MCP
Registered ClawMem MCP in /home/kang/.claude.json
Command: /home/kang/.npm-global/lib/node_modules/clawmem/bin/clawmem mcp

ClawMem bootstrapped for /home/kang/notes

kang@SH260401:~$ clawmem setup openclaw
Installed plugin: /home/kang/.openclaw/extensions/clawmem → /home/kang/.npm-global/lib/node_modules/clawmem/src/openclaw

Note: OpenClaw v2026.4.10+ recommended — earlier versions
have a bug where plugins.slots.contextEngine is silently dropped
during config normalization (openclaw/openclaw#64192).

Next steps:

1. Restart OpenClaw gateway to discover the plugin:
   openclaw gateway restart

2. Set ClawMem as the active context engine (after restart):
   openclaw config set plugins.slots.contextEngine clawmem

3. Configure GPU endpoints (if not using defaults):
   openclaw config set plugins.entries.clawmem.config.gpuEmbed http://YOUR_GPU:8088
   openclaw config set plugins.entries.clawmem.config.gpuLlm http://YOUR_GPU:8089
   openclaw config set plugins.entries.clawmem.config.gpuRerank http://YOUR_GPU:8090

4. Start the REST API (for agent tools):
   clawmem serve &

ClawMem will work alongside Claude Code hooks — both modes share the same vault.
kang@SH260401:$ openclaw gateway restart
kang@SH260401:$ openclaw gateway
kang@SH260401:~$ openclaw config set plugins.slots.contextEngine clawmem

🦞 OpenClaw 2026.4.11 (769908e) — Less clicking, more shipping, fewer "where did that file go" moments.

Config overwrite: /home/kang/.openclaw/openclaw.json (sha256 486282866c38c1e0d5a0ce587e29170b6912802b66433b1fc167e75364141948 -> bdc8c529a0d05ddb92d49656bfec530d5d5011ccf5fc33a261e67ab8eacbd011, backup=/home/kang/.openclaw/openclaw.json.bak)
Updated plugins.slots.contextEngine. Restart the gateway to apply.
kang@SH260401:~$ openclaw gateway restart

kang@SH260401:~$ openclaw gateway

🦞 OpenClaw 2026.4.11 (769908e) — Like having a senior engineer on call, except I don't bill hourly or sigh audibly.

│
◇
17:45:01+09:00 [gateway] loading configuration…
17:45:01+09:00 [gateway] resolving authentication…
17:45:01+09:00 [gateway] starting...
17:45:07+09:00 [gateway] starting HTTP server...
17:45:07+09:00 [canvas] host mounted at http://127.0.0.1:18789/__openclaw__/canvas/ (root /home/kang/.openclaw/canvas)
17:45:07+09:00 [gateway] MCP loopback server listening on http://127.0.0.1:45141/mcp
17:45:07+09:00 [heartbeat] started
17:45:07+09:00 [health-monitor] started (interval: 300s, startup-grace: 60s, channel-connect-grace: 120s)
17:45:07+09:00 [gateway] agent model: ollama/qwen3.5
17:45:07+09:00 [gateway] ready (5 plugins: acpx, browser, device-pair, phone-control, talk-voice; 5.9s)
17:45:07+09:00 [gateway] log file: /tmp/openclaw/openclaw-2026-04-13.log
17:45:07+09:00 [gateway] security warning: dangerous config flags enabled: gateway.controlUi.allowInsecureAuth=true. Run openclaw security audit.
17:45:07+09:00 [gateway] starting channels and sidecars...
17:45:07+09:00 [hooks] loaded 4 internal hook handlers
17:45:44+09:00 [ws] closed before connect conn=1d5b12e8-f74f-403b-880d-83830a9941e2 peer=127.0.0.1:60879->127.0.0.1:18789 remote=127.0.0.1 fwd=n/a origin=http://localhost:18789 host=localhost:18789 ua=Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/147.0.0.0 Safari/537.36 code=1006 reason=n/a
17:45:44+09:00 [ws] webchat connected conn=d270fcd0-fe93-4e09-9b57-3d891cc934c6 remote=127.0.0.1 client=openclaw-control-ui webchat v2026.4.11
17:45:44+09:00 [ws] ⇄ res ✗ chat.history 1ms errorCode=UNAVAILABLE errorMessage=chat.history unavailable during gateway startup conn=d270fcd0…34c6 id=87345a30…f5b5
17:45:55+09:00 [bonjour] restarting advertiser (service stuck in announcing for 11229ms (gateway fqdn=SH260401 (OpenClaw)._openclaw-gw._tcp.local. host=openclaw.local. port=18789 state=announcing))
17:46:02+09:00 [ws] ⇄ res ✓ models.list 18031ms conn=d270fcd0…34c6 id=e19d36ab…5697
17:46:02+09:00 [bonjour] watchdog detected non-announced service; attempting re-advertise (gateway fqdn=SH260401 (OpenClaw)._openclaw-gw._tcp.local. host=openclaw.local. port=18789 state=unannounced)
17:46:02+09:00 [plugins] embedded acpx runtime backend registered (cwd: /home/kang/.openclaw/workspace)
17:46:02+09:00 [browser/server] Browser control listening on http://127.0.0.1:18791/ (auth=token)
17:46:02+09:00 [ws] ⇄ res ✓ node.list 7110ms conn=d270fcd0…34c6 id=61fef204…bad9
17:46:03+09:00 [plugins] embedded acpx runtime backend ready
17:46:12+09:00 [bonjour] restarting advertiser (service stuck in unannounced for 10001ms (gateway fqdn=SH260401 (OpenClaw)._openclaw-gw._tcp.local. host=openclaw.local. port=18789 state=unannounced))

17:47:00+09:00 [diagnostic] lane task error: lane=main durationMs=2072 error="Error: Context engine "clawmem" is not registered. Available engines: legacy"
17:47:00+09:00 [diagnostic] lane task error: lane=session:agent:main:main durationMs=2077 error="Error: Context engine "clawmem" is not registered. Available engines: legacy"
17:47:00+09:00 Embedded agent failed before reply: Context engine "clawmem" is not registered. Available engines: legacy

clawmem is not registered...
and chat message out:
⚠️ Agent failed before reply: Context engine "clawmem" is not registered. Available engines: legacy.
Logs: openclaw logs --follow

[konradre]

v0.10.0 shipped: this is now fixed end-to-end

@withx, thanks for coming back with the clean v2026.4.11 reproduction. It was exactly what your log showed: OpenClaw v2026.4.11 changed its plugin discovery path, and every ClawMem version before v0.10.0 silently fails to register on it. Nothing you did was wrong. The workflow you followed was the correct one for the pre-v2026.4.11 world, and the gap was on our side.

Leaving this issue open so anyone hitting the same failure on current OpenClaw releases lands here on a search.

What actually broke

OpenClaw v2026.4.11 tightened plugin discovery in two ways that both hit ClawMem's installer at the same time.

Symlinked plugin directories are skipped silently. The new discoverer walks ~/.openclaw/extensions/ with readdirSync({ withFileTypes: true }) and then gates descent with dirent.isDirectory(). Node's lstatSync (which the withFileTypes: true API uses to build its dirents) reports isDirectory() === false on a symlink to a directory, even when the target is a real directory. Every ClawMem release up to v0.8.x installed its OpenClaw plugin as a symlink into ~/.openclaw/extensions/clawmem. That worked fine on OpenClaw v2026.3.x but stopped being discoverable on v2026.4.11. No warning, no error. The directory is just invisible to the discoverer.

package.json with openclaw.extensions is now the discovery gate. Pre-v2026.4.11, a plugin directory only needed openclaw.plugin.json to be considered. v2026.4.11's discoverer also checks for a package.json containing an openclaw.extensions: ["./index.ts"] field before it will descend into a candidate directory. ClawMem shipped the older manifest only, so even a freshly-created symlink-less directory would have failed the new gate.

Your log is the canonical symptom. Gateway comes up with 5 plugins (acpx, browser, device-pair, phone-control, talk-voice), ClawMem is absent from the ready line, and the chat path dies with Context engine "clawmem" is not registered. Available engines: legacy.

The fix: ClawMem v0.10.0

v0.10.0 is on main and tagged. Two parts to the release.

Packaging (what unblocks you):

• src/openclaw/package.json now ships with openclaw.extensions: ["./index.ts"] declared. Clears the new v2026.4.11 discovery gate.
• clawmem setup openclaw defaults to a recursive copy (cpSync(..., { recursive: true, dereference: true })) instead of a symlink. A new --link opt-in flag preserves the old symlink behavior for local dev or for people still on older OpenClaw, with a warning that v2026.4.11+ discovery will skip symlinks.
• The printed next steps now call openclaw plugins enable clawmem instead of openclaw config set plugins.slots.contextEngine clawmem. The enable verb pre-validates discovery, so it only runs on a successful install, and it switches the exclusive slot + disables any competing memory plugin in a single command.
• Setup fails loudly if src/openclaw/package.json is missing, so a broken shipment fails at setup time instead of silently not registering at runtime.

§14.3 pure-memory migration (why the slot changed from contextEngine to memory):

OpenClaw's plugin kind vocabulary has been shifting over the past few weeks, and it landed somewhere different from where we were wired. The context-engine slot originally covered both persistent-memory and live-session-compaction responsibilities. That is how ClawMem got plugged in. Through v2026.4.x the OpenClaw maintainers narrowed the context-engine slot to runtime compaction / compression specifically, and introduced a separate memory slot for durable cross-session retrieval backends. Hermes has had the same split from day one via its MemoryProvider ABC, which is why the src/hermes/ adapter in this repo has always been registered correctly. The OpenClaw adapter is what had to move.

Under the stabilized definition ClawMem is a memory layer. The vault lives in SQLite, it persists across sessions, it runs hybrid retrieval over a full-text index plus vector embeddings plus a knowledge graph, and it feeds results into the agent via <vault-context> injection and five explicit tools. It does not compact transcripts, it does not summarize live turns, and it does not own a compression algorithm. v0.10.0 moves the OpenClaw adapter to kind: memory and frees the context-engine slot so you can put an actual compression plugin there alongside ClawMem.

Recommended pairing. A good companion in the freed context-engine slot is lossless-claw, an LCM (Lossless Context Management) plugin for OpenClaw that runs inside the live session window. ClawMem answers "what did we decide last week and what do we know about this project." lossless-claw answers "the live session window is 80% full, compress the older turns without losing anything load-bearing." They run on different data at different time scales and do not overlap. If you were previously using ClawMem to cover both jobs, v0.10.0 is the upgrade that lets you split the responsibilities cleanly.

What to run

Assuming you are on OpenClaw v2026.4.11 (the fresh-install path from your latest reply):

# 1. Pull ClawMem v0.10.0
npm update -g clawmem
clawmem --version          # should print 0.10.0

# 2. Re-run setup. This now produces a real directory at
#    ~/.openclaw/extensions/clawmem, not a symlink.
clawmem setup openclaw

# 3. Enable the plugin in the exclusive memory slot.
#    Pre-validates discovery, disables memory-core automatically.
openclaw plugins enable clawmem

# 4. Restart the gateway.
openclaw gateway restart

If npm update does not pick up v0.10.0, clear the cache: npm cache clean --force && npm install -g clawmem@latest.

How to verify it worked

After the gateway restart, the ready line and the plugin-registration log should look like this:

[plugins] clawmem: plugin registered (kind=memory, bin=..., profile=balanced, budget=800)
[plugins] clawmem: registered 5 agent tools
[gateway] ready (6 plugins: acpx, browser, clawmem, device-pair, phone-control, talk-voice; ...s)

Two specific things to look for:

1. kind=memory in the plugin registered line. That proves the §14.3 refactor is live. Pre-v0.10.0 said kind=context-engine.
2. clawmem in the ready (N plugins: ...) list, alongside the stock plugins. Your previous reproduction showed 5 plugins with ClawMem absent. The new ready line shows ClawMem in the list.

You can also check:

openclaw plugins list | grep clawmem
openclaw plugins inspect clawmem    # should show Kind: memory, Status: enabled
journalctl --user -u openclaw-gateway -f | grep clawmem

If you still see the old error after upgrade

Four things to check, in order:

1. clawmem --version prints 0.10.0. If it still prints 0.8.x, the npm cache is stale (see above).
2. ~/.openclaw/extensions/clawmem/package.json exists and contains the openclaw.extensions array. If it is missing, setup did not run cleanly.
3. ls -la ~/.openclaw/extensions/ shows clawmem as a directory, not a symlink. v0.10.0 setup replaces any existing symlink automatically, but if you ran setup with --link you will still have one.
4. openclaw config get plugins.slots.memory returns clawmem, not memory-core, and not contextEngine. If it still says contextEngine, you have a stale pre-v0.10.0 entry: run openclaw config set plugins.slots.contextEngine "" to clear it, then openclaw plugins enable clawmem again.

One more gotcha, unlikely for a WSL single-user install but worth flagging for anyone coming here with a multi-user setup: if the OpenClaw gateway runs as a dedicated system user (openclaw, usually) that is different from the user who ran clawmem setup openclaw, OpenClaw v2026.4.11 rejects the copied plugin directory with suspicious ownership (uid=X, expected uid=Y or root). The fix is sudo chown -R <gateway-user>:<gateway-group> ~/.openclaw/extensions/clawmem. Single-user installs are not affected because the installer user and the gateway user are the same.

References

• RELEASE_NOTES.md: v0.10.0 entry at the top.
• docs/guides/upgrading.md: v0.9.0 to v0.10.0 section.
• docs/guides/openclaw-plugin.md: new "Memory vs context engine" section explaining the dual plugin surface.
• docs/troubleshooting.md: OpenClaw section, now covers all four v2026.4.11 failure modes.

Your fresh reproduction on a clean machine is what made it clear this was a packaging gap and not a config-drift issue on our development instances. Credited in the release notes. Thanks for the careful repro. A lot of users would not have bothered retrying after a reinstall.

Leaving this open as a reference for anyone else hitting the v2026.4.11 discovery symptom. A fresh comment with the gateway journal excerpt is the fastest path to a diagnosis if the upgrade does not clear things for you.

[withx]

Thank you for your help. I have successfully configured clawmem as per the instructions.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
openclaw@OpenClaw:~$ openclaw plugins inspect clawmem
08:54:42 [plugins] clawmem: plugin registered (kind=memory, bin=clawmem, profile=balanced, budget=800)
08:54:42 [plugins] clawmem: registered 5 agent tools

🦞 OpenClaw 2026.4.15 (041266a) — Say "stop" and I'll stop—say "ship" and we'll both learn a lesson.

08:54:48 [plugins] clawmem: plugin registered (kind=memory, bin=clawmem, profile=balanced, budget=800)
08:54:48 [plugins] clawmem: registered 5 agent tools
ClawMem
id: clawmem
On-device hybrid memory layer for OpenClaw — composite scoring, graph traversal, lifecycle management, and pre-emptive compaction state extraction

Status: loaded
Format: openclaw
Source: ~/.openclaw/extensions/clawmem/index.ts
Origin: global
Version: 0.10.1
Shape: non-capability
Capability mode: none
Legacy before_agent_start: no

Typed hooks:
agent_end
before_compaction
before_prompt_build (priority 10)
before_reset
session_end
session_start

Tools:
clawmem_search, clawmem_search
clawmem_get, clawmem_get
clawmem_session_log, clawmem_session_log
clawmem_timeline, clawmem_timeline
clawmem_similar, clawmem_similar

Services:
clawmem-api
openclaw@OpenClaw:~$ journalctl --user -u openclaw-gateway -f | grep clawmem
Apr 22 08:50:15 OpenClaw node[1124]: 2026-04-22T08:50:15.246+09:00 [plugins] [clawmem-serve] ClawMem HTTP server listening on http://127.0.0.1:7438
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Apr 22 09:01:25 OpenClaw node[1124]: 2026-04-22T09:01:25.998+09:00 [ws] ⇄ res ✓ node.list 654ms conn=03e68d03…73bc id=14612f73…a4ea
Apr 22 09:04:02 OpenClaw node[1124]: 2026-04-22T09:04:02.380+09:00 [plugins] clawmem: session ended 15262fed-14ee-45d0-a715-e60003999c7c (0 messages)
Apr 22 09:04:03 OpenClaw node[1124]: 2026-04-22T09:04:03.875+09:00 [plugins] clawmem: session started c4c4fed6-837f-469b-b4fb-ed4defa97800
Apr 22 09:04:18 OpenClaw node[1124]: 2026-04-22T09:04:18.378+09:00 [hooks/session-memory] Session context saved to ~/.openclaw/workspace/memory/2026-04-22-openclaw-control-ui.md
Apr 22 09:04:18 OpenClaw node[1124]: 2026-04-22T09:04:18.744+09:00 [plugins] clawmem: before_reset cleanup for 15262fed-14ee-45d0-a715-e60003999c7c
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CHAT:
My favorite sport is playing football.
openclaw-control-ui

Got it! Football it is. Is there something specific you'd like to do with that, or just sharing?
Assistant 

My favorite sport is?
openclaw-control-ui

My favorite sport is playing football.
Assistant 

/new
You

Hey! I'm just waking up — ready to roll. Who am I? What's on your mind today?
Assistant

My favorite sport is?
openclaw-control-ui

hat question is a bit vague since I don't have access to your personal preferences or profile yet.
Could you tell me a bit more about yourself or what you'd like help with today?
Assistant

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Question:
Can clawmem only remember things within the current session? How do I make it keep memory across new sessions?
How to set it up in OpenClaw or clawmem?

[konradre]

The gap is that OpenClaw is writing the session memory, but ClawMem doesn't know to index that path. When you said "My favorite sport is playing football" in session A, your gateway log shows OpenClaw's [hooks/session-memory] saved the conversation to ~/.openclaw/workspace/memory/2026-04-22-openclaw-control-ui.md. That file exists. But your ClawMem setup only has the ~/notes collection. The football fact never got indexed, so on session B's before_prompt_build, ClawMem had nothing to surface.

Three commands fix the immediate test:

clawmem collection add ~/.openclaw/workspace/memory --name openclaw-sessions
clawmem update
clawmem embed

After that, restart the gateway and start a new chat. The next time you ask "What's my favorite sport?", before_prompt_build will pull the football fact out of the indexed session file and inject it into the agent's context.

For this to keep working without manual update + embed after every session, set up the user-systemd watcher so new files in your collections auto-index:

systemctl --user enable --now clawmem-watcher
systemctl --user enable --now clawmem-embed.timer

The watcher reindexes on file change. The timer runs clawmem embed daily at 04:00 UTC (configurable). With both running, anything OpenClaw drops into ~/.openclaw/workspace/memory/ becomes searchable on the next session within seconds (index) and minutes-to-hours (embeddings, depending on backlog).

Two related collections worth considering, if applicable to your workflow:

• ~/.claude/CLAUDE.md and other Claude Code memory paths if you also use Claude Code
• Any project-specific MEMORY.md files in repos you actively work on

The general mental model: ClawMem retrieves from indexed content. OpenClaw drops session memory into a file but doesn't add the file to any ClawMem collection on its own. The collection-add step is the bridge.