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OpenClaw Coder (experimental)

Turn an OpenClaw agent into an autonomous AI programmer. Two use cases:

  1. For developers — a programming partner instead of a programming tool.
  2. For non-developers — a teammate who handles simple coding tasks.

Architecture

Install OpenClaw on a VPS.

flowchart TD
  U([User]) -->|"asks via Discord / Slack"| O[OpenClaw]
  O -->|"delegates the task<br/>(openclaw-coder-playbook + alignfirst-coaching skills)"| CC[Claude Code]
  CC -->|"does the work<br/>(alignfirst skill)"| FS[(Your codebase)]
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OpenClaw runs the conversation and, when there's code to write, hands the task to Claude Code through the openclaw-coder-playbook and alignfirst-coaching skills. Claude Code does the actual work with the alignfirst skill, then returns the result for OpenClaw to relay back to the user.

Supported OpenClaw channels

The playbook is designed for Slack and Discord.

Configuring the VPS

Your projects

Put your git repositories in ~/projects/.

If your bot needs access to a git platform (GitHub, GitLab), set it up.

Claude Code

Your AI developer is a modern developer. It needs the real Claude Code CLI.

  • Install the Claude Code CLI and authenticate it with your account. The claude command must work in the terminal.
  • Install the alignfirst skill:
npx skills add https://github.com/paleo/alignfirst --global --yes --agent claude-code --skill alignfirst

Skill:

  • alignfirst — spec/plan/code workflow for coding tasks.

Skills for OpenClaw

OpenClaw will need these skills: openclaw-coder-playbook, alignfirst-coaching, alignfirst:

npx skills add https://github.com/paleo/alignfirst --global --yes --agent universal \
  --skill openclaw-coder-playbook --skill alignfirst-coaching --skill alignfirst

Skills:

  • openclaw-coder-playbook — operating instructions for an OpenClaw AI coder.
  • alignfirst-coaching — teaches the agent to delegate coding tasks to Claude Code.
  • alignfirst — not strictly needed, but it helps the bot understand its coding tool.

Optional alignfirst-coaching environment variables:

export ALIGNFIRST_COACHING_LOG_DIR=path/to/directory # Write input/output logs
export ALIGNFIRST_COACHING_SKIP_PERMISSIONS=1        # Use --dangerously-skip-permissions instead of --permission-mode auto
export ALIGNFIRST_COACHING_UNSET=ANTHROPIC_API_KEY   # Unset listed vars (comma-separated) before calling claude, e.g. to force an SSO/plan account

openclaw.json

OpenClaw needs a coding tool profile that can still post to chat, and the three skills wired in:

{
  "tools": {
    "profile": "coding",
    "alsoAllow": ["message"] // let the channel session open threads and post
  },
  "agents": {
    "defaults": {
      "skills": ["alignfirst", "alignfirst-coaching", "openclaw-coder-playbook"]
    }
  },
  "channels": {
    "slack": {
      "replyToMode": "all",
      "thread": { "initialHistoryLimit": 100 }
    },
    "discord": {
      // Leave `autoThread` off for Discord
    }
  }
}

The playbook expects each task to run in its own thread session. With Slack, replyToMode: "all" answers every user message in a new thread. On Discord the agent opens the thread itself, so autoThread stays off; alsoAllow: ["message"] is what lets it do so.

workspace/AGENTS.md

Here is an example of a workspace's AGENTS.md. The only required part is the first section.

Feel free to adapt the other sections. In particular, replace the instructions related to tickets with your own instructions on how to access your Linear, Jira, or GitHub/GitLab issues.

Contribute

The openclaw-coder-playbook skill is developed against an internal regression-test harness: playbook-test/README.md. Maintainer overview: docs/openclaw-coder.md.

Get started:

# From this `openclaw-coder/` directory
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/openclaw/openclaw.git .local/openclaw

cd playbook-test

cp .env.local.example .env.local
# Set the API keys in `.env.local` as needed

npm install && npm run env:build

# Run scenarios, e.g. all of them on every channel:
npm run e2e -- --channel all --all