OpenClaw Context Manager: VPS Agent State

OpenClaw Context Manager for Lightweight VPS Deployments

OpenClaw-RESIDUE is a lightweight context management solution purpose-built for deploying OpenClaw AI agents on resource-constrained environments like small VPS instances. It addresses a critical gap in the OpenClaw ecosystem: maintaining coherent agent state and decision history without the overhead of heavyweight persistence layers, enabling practical deployment of AI agents on budget-friendly infrastructure.

Core Features

• Hard State Persistence: Maintains immutable agent goals, constraints, and capabilities in YAML format—critical information that cannot be lost without breaking agent coherence.
• Assertion-Based Memory: Captures decisions, TODOs, rejections, and facts in append-only JSON logs, creating an auditable decision trail without database overhead.
• Turn-Level Prompt Assembly: Dynamically constructs prompts by combining persistent hard state with the most recent N assertions plus current user input, ensuring context relevance within token budgets.
• Pattern-Based Auto-Extraction: Automatically parses model outputs to extract decisions, action items, negations, and facts according to configurable rules.
• Phase-Aware State Machine: Tracks agent progression through setup → planning → execution → review stages, enabling phase-specific context handling and decision validation.
• Minimal HTTP API: Three core endpoints (GET /state, POST /assertion, POST /review) enable integration with bots and automation scripts without complex orchestration.
• Native OpenClaw Skills: Includes ocm-state and ocm-review skills that integrate directly into OpenClaw's ecosystem, eliminating bridging complexity.

Architecture & Design Philosophy

OpenClaw-RESIDUE splits context management into two complementary layers: hard state (YAML-persisted ground truth) and soft assertions (JSON append-only log). This separation optimizes for VPS constraints—hard state remains small and frequently updated, while assertions grow naturally but can be pruned or archived without losing the agent's core identity.

The HTTP API design prioritizes statelessness and composability. Rather than managing long-lived connections or complex sessions, each request is self-contained, making it compatible with simple deployment patterns (systemd services, cron jobs, webhook handlers) common on small VPS environments.

Getting Started

Installation & Initialization:

cd openclaw-context-manager
npm install
npm run build
node dist/bin/ocm.js init

After initialization, the context manager is ready to receive state and assertion operations. Full configuration options (including custom extraction rules and phase definitions) are documented in the accompanying docs folder.

Who This Is For

• VPS/Self-Hosted Operators: Teams running OpenClaw agents on $5–15/month instances need lightweight, file-based state management without Postgres or Redis.
• AI Agent Builders: Developers integrating decision-making and reasoning capabilities into applications benefit from structured assertion logging and phase tracking.
• Cost-Conscious Deployments: Organizations prioritizing infrastructure efficiency over ultra-high availability can leverage RESIDUE's minimal resource footprint.
• OpenClaw Ecosystem Contributors: Developers extending OpenClaw with new skills or connectors can use RESIDUE's state API as a standardized context layer.

Integration Patterns

RESIDUE supports multiple deployment patterns. Use the npm package programmatically in Node.js services, invoke the CLI (ocm) from shell scripts or cron jobs, or call the HTTP API from external bots and webhooks. The included OpenClaw Skills (ocm-state, ocm-review) provide direct integration into OpenClaw workflows by copying them to ~/.openclaw/skills/.

Project Maturity & Status

This is an active TypeScript/JavaScript project currently maintained by chaoshou-coder. Recent updates (February 2026) indicate ongoing development. While the project is lightweight and focused, prospective users should review the documentation and test assertions extraction rules against their specific use cases before production deployment.

Related Resources

Antfarm: Multi-Agent Workflow Orchestration for OpenClaw | AI Agent Context Management | Lightweight State Persistence | VPS Deployment Patterns

Repository: chaoshou-coder/OpenClaw-RESIDUE