OpenClaw Tmux Persistent Process

Run programs that survive OpenClaw exec session cleanup and gateway restarts.

Why every OpenClaw user should have this

OpenClaw runs shell commands via exec. But exec has a critical limitation that most users don't realize until something breaks:

• Background processes are tied to the exec session. When the session cleans up (idle timeout, context compaction, or gateway restart), all background processes receive SIGKILL and die immediately.
• Gateway restarts kill everything. Updates, config changes, or openclaw gateway restart — all running exec processes are gone.
• No warning. Your tunnel, dev server, or build task just silently disappears.

This means anything you expect to keep running — a tunnel for a client demo, a dev server, a long build — can die at any moment without notice.

The solution: Use tmux to create virtual terminals completely decoupled from the exec lifecycle. Programs in tmux survive gateway restarts, exec cleanup, and session timeouts. tmux runs independently of OpenClaw — even if the gateway goes down, your processes keep running.

Rule of thumb: If a command might run longer than 2 minutes, use tmux.

Socket convention

All operations use a dedicated socket to avoid interfering with the user's own tmux:

SOCK="/tmp/openclaw-tmux/openclaw.sock"
mkdir -p /tmp/openclaw-tmux

Start a process

SESSION="my-server"

# Check if already running
if tmux -S "$SOCK" has-session -t "$SESSION" 2>/dev/null; then
  echo "already running"
else
  tmux -S "$SOCK" new -d -s "$SESSION" \
    "cd /path/to/project && npm run dev"
  echo "started"
fi

Monitor

# List all sessions
tmux -S "$SOCK" list-sessions

# View last 30 lines of output
tmux -S "$SOCK" capture-pane -t "$SESSION" -p -S -30

# Check if process is idle (back to shell prompt)
tmux -S "$SOCK" capture-pane -t "$SESSION" -p -S -3 \
  | grep -qE '\$\s*$|❯' && echo "IDLE" || echo "RUNNING"

Interact

# Send a command
tmux -S "$SOCK" send-keys -t "$SESSION" "command" Enter

# Send literal text (recommended, no special key parsing)
tmux -S "$SOCK" send-keys -t "$SESSION" -l -- "literal text"
tmux -S "$SOCK" send-keys -t "$SESSION" Enter

# Ctrl+C to interrupt
tmux -S "$SOCK" send-keys -t "$SESSION" C-c

Stop / cleanup

# Kill one session
tmux -S "$SOCK" kill-session -t "$SESSION"

# Kill all
tmux -S "$SOCK" kill-server

# Clean stale socket
rm -f "$SOCK"

Start interactive programs (wait for ready)

For programs that need startup time (e.g. coding agents, REPLs):

SESSION="my-task"
tmux -S "$SOCK" new -d -s "$SESSION"
tmux -S "$SOCK" send-keys -t "$SESSION" "cd ~/project && node" Enter

# Wait for prompt before sending commands
for i in $(seq 1 15); do
  OUTPUT=$(tmux -S "$SOCK" capture-pane -t "$SESSION" -p -S -5)
  if echo "$OUTPUT" | grep -qE '❯|>\s*$|ready'; then
    break
  fi
  sleep 1
done

# Now safe to send input
tmux -S "$SOCK" send-keys -t "$SESSION" -l "your command"
tmux -S "$SOCK" send-keys -t "$SESSION" Enter

Common use cases

Session naming

Lowercase + hyphens. No spaces.

dev-server       — development servers
tunnel-{name}    — tunnels (ngrok, cloudflared, etc.)
build-{project}  — build tasks
worker-{name}    — background workers

Important notes

• Reboot = gone. tmux doesn't survive system restarts. Re-create sessions after reboot.
• Scrollback limit. Default 2000 lines. Increase with: tmux set-option -t "$SESSION" history-limit 10000
• Socket stale. If list-sessions says "error connecting", delete the socket and recreate.
• Environment. tmux inherits env at creation time. Set vars in the command: tmux new -d -s name "export KEY=val && cmd"
• No conflict. Dedicated socket means zero interference with user's own tmux.

Requirements

• tmux 2.6+ (for send-keys -l literal mode)
• Check: tmux -V
• Install: brew install tmux (macOS) or apt install tmux (Linux)