* fix(gateway): normalize session key casing to prevent ghost sessions on Linux
On case-sensitive filesystems (Linux), mixed-case session keys like
agent:ops:MySession and agent:ops:mysession resolve to different store
entries, creating ghost duplicates that never converge.
Core changes in session-utils.ts:
- resolveSessionStoreKey: lowercase all session key components
- canonicalizeSpawnedByForAgent: accept cfg, resolve main-alias references
via canonicalizeMainSessionAlias after lowercasing
- loadSessionEntry: return legacyKey only when it differs from canonicalKey
- resolveGatewaySessionStoreTarget: scan store for case-insensitive matches;
add optional scanLegacyKeys param to skip disk reads for read-only callers
- Export findStoreKeysIgnoreCase for use by write-path consumers
- Compare global/unknown sentinels case-insensitively in all canonicalization
functions
sessions-resolve.ts:
- Make resolveSessionKeyFromResolveParams async for inline migration
- Check canonical key first (fast path), then fall back to legacy scan
- Delete ALL legacy case-variant keys in a single updateSessionStore pass
Fixes#12603
* fix(gateway): propagate canonical keys and clean up all case variants on write paths
- agent.ts: use canonicalizeSpawnedByForAgent (with cfg) instead of raw
toLowerCase; use findStoreKeysIgnoreCase to delete all legacy variants
on store write; pass canonicalKey to addChatRun, registerAgentRunContext,
resolveSendPolicy, and agentCommand
- sessions.ts: replace single-key migration with full case-variant cleanup
via findStoreKeysIgnoreCase in patch/reset/delete/compact handlers; add
case-insensitive fallback in preview (store already loaded); make
sessions.resolve handler async; pass scanLegacyKeys: false in preview
- server-node-events.ts: use findStoreKeysIgnoreCase to clean all legacy
variants on voice.transcript and agent.request write paths; pass
canonicalKey to addChatRun and agentCommand
* test(gateway): add session key case-normalization tests
Cover the case-insensitive session key canonicalization logic:
- resolveSessionStoreKey normalizes mixed-case bare and prefixed keys
- resolveSessionStoreKey resolves mixed-case main aliases (MAIN, Main)
- resolveGatewaySessionStoreTarget includes legacy mixed-case store keys
- resolveGatewaySessionStoreTarget collects all case-variant duplicates
- resolveGatewaySessionStoreTarget finds legacy main alias keys with
customized mainKey configuration
All 5 tests fail before the production changes, pass after.
* fix: clean legacy session alias cleanup gaps (openclaw#12846) thanks @mcaxtr
---------
Co-authored-by: Peter Steinberger <steipete@gmail.com>
Small model testing showed the label did not meaningfully help:
- Sub-3B models fail regardless of format
- 8B models untested with label specifically
- Frontier models never needed it
The bracket convention [Wed 2026-01-28 22:30 EST] matches existing
channel envelope format and is widely present in training data.
Saves ~2-3 tokens per message vs the labeled version.
Changes [Wed 2026-01-28 20:30 EST] to [Current Date: Wed 2026-01-28 20:30 EST].
Tested with qwen3-1.7B: even with DOW in the timestamp, the model
ignored it and tried to compute the day using Zeller's Congruence.
The "Current Date:" semantic label is widely present in training data
and gives small models the best chance of recognizing the timestamp
as authoritative context rather than metadata to parse.
Cost: ~18 tokens per message. Prevents hallucination spirals that
burn hundreds or thousands of tokens on date derivation.
Changes [2026-01-28 20:30 EST] to [Wed 2026-01-28 20:30 EST].
Costs ~1 extra token but provides day-of-week for smaller models
that can't derive DOW from a date. Frontier models already handle
it, but this is cheap insurance for 7B-class models.
Replace verbose formatUserTime (Wednesday, January 28th, 2026 — 8:30 PM)
with the same formatZonedTimestamp used by channel envelopes (2026-01-28
20:30 EST). This:
- Saves ~4 tokens per message (~7 vs ~11)
- Uses globally unambiguous YYYY-MM-DD 24h format
- Removes 12/24h config option (always 24h, agent-facing)
- Anchors envelope detection to the actual format function — if channels
change their timestamp format, our injection + detection change too
- Adds test that compares injection output to formatZonedTimestamp directly
Exported formatZonedTimestamp from auto-reply/envelope.ts for reuse.
Messages arriving through the gateway agent method (TUI, web, spawned
subagents, sessions_send, heartbeats) now get a timestamp prefix
automatically. This gives all agent contexts date/time awareness
without modifying the system prompt (which is cached for stability).
Channel messages (Discord, Telegram, etc.) already have timestamps
via envelope formatting in a separate code path and never reach
the agent handler, so there is no double-stamping risk.
Cron jobs also inject their own 'Current time:' prefix and are
detected and skipped.
Extracted as a pure function (injectTimestamp) with 12 unit tests
covering: timezone handling, 12/24h format, midnight boundaries,
envelope detection, cron detection, and empty messages.
Integration test verifies the agent handler wires it in correctly.
Closes#3658
Refs: #1897, #1928, #2108
- Add resumeArgs to DEFAULT_CLAUDE_BACKEND for proper --resume flag usage
- Fix gateway not preserving cliSessionIds/claudeCliSessionId in nextEntry
- Add test for CLI session ID preservation in gateway agent handler
- Update docs with new resumeArgs default
