Complete Guide to Building Automation Workflows with OpenClaw

Introduction

OpenClaw is more than just a chatbot -- it can also serve as the core of your automation workflows. Through scheduled tasks, event-driven triggers, and third-party integrations, you can have OpenClaw automatically handle daily report summaries, content monitoring, message forwarding, and more. This article introduces a variety of practical automation approaches.

1. Scheduled Tasks (Cron Integration)

1.1 Basic Concept

Trigger AI tasks on a schedule by calling OpenClaw's API via cron:

# Send a message via the OpenClaw Gateway API
curl -X POST http://localhost:18789/api/v1/send \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "channel": "telegram",
    "chatId": "YOUR_CHAT_ID",
    "message": "Please generate today'\''s work summary"
  }'

1.2 Daily Morning Briefing

Create a scheduled task that pushes a news summary every morning at 8:00 AM:

#!/bin/bash
# /usr/local/bin/openclaw-morning-brief.sh

API_URL="http://localhost:18789/api/v1/chat"
CHAT_ID="YOUR_TELEGRAM_CHAT_ID"

# Call OpenClaw to generate the morning briefing
RESPONSE=$(curl -sf -X POST "$API_URL" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "channel": "telegram",
    "chatId": "'"$CHAT_ID"'",
    "message": "Based on today'\''s date, generate a morning briefing that includes: 1. What day it is today 2. Weather reminders 3. To-do review 4. An inspirational quote",
    "systemPrompt": "You are a professional daily briefing assistant. Keep your replies concise and well-organized, using emoji to enhance readability."
  }')

echo "[$(date)] Morning briefing sent: $RESPONSE" >> /var/log/openclaw-cron.log

# Set up the cron job
chmod +x /usr/local/bin/openclaw-morning-brief.sh
crontab -e
# Add the following line (runs at 8:00 AM daily)
# 0 8 * * * /usr/local/bin/openclaw-morning-brief.sh

1.3 Periodic System Health Report

#!/bin/bash
# /usr/local/bin/openclaw-system-report.sh

# Gather system information
DISK_USAGE=$(df -h / | tail -1 | awk '{print $5}')
MEMORY_USAGE=$(free -m | awk 'NR==2{printf "%.1f%%", $3*100/$2}')
CPU_LOAD=$(uptime | awk -F'load average: ' '{print $2}')
OPENCLAW_STATUS=$(curl -sf http://localhost:18789/health | jq -r '.status')
UPTIME=$(uptime -p)

# Build the report content
REPORT="Server Health Report:
- Uptime: $UPTIME
- CPU Load: $CPU_LOAD
- Memory Usage: $MEMORY_USAGE
- Disk Usage: $DISK_USAGE
- OpenClaw Status: $OPENCLAW_STATUS

Please analyze the data above and provide optimization recommendations for any abnormal metrics."

# Send to the administrator
curl -sf -X POST http://localhost:18789/api/v1/send \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "channel": "telegram",
    "chatId": "ADMIN_CHAT_ID",
    "message": "'"$(echo "$REPORT" | sed 's/"/\\"/g')"'"
  }'

# Generate the health report at 10:00 PM daily
# 0 22 * * * /usr/local/bin/openclaw-system-report.sh

2. Event-Driven Workflows

2.1 File Change Triggers

Monitor a directory and automatically process new files:

#!/bin/bash
# /usr/local/bin/openclaw-file-watcher.sh
# Uses inotifywait to monitor file changes

WATCH_DIR="/home/user/incoming-docs"
API_URL="http://localhost:18789/api/v1/chat"

inotifywait -m -e create "$WATCH_DIR" --format '%f' | while read filename; do
    echo "[$(date)] New file detected: $filename"

    # Read file content (limited size)
    CONTENT=$(head -c 5000 "$WATCH_DIR/$filename")

    # Send to OpenClaw for processing
    curl -sf -X POST "$API_URL" \
      -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
      -d '{
        "channel": "telegram",
        "chatId": "ADMIN_CHAT_ID",
        "message": "New file received: '"$filename"'. Please summarize the key points:\n\n'"$(echo "$CONTENT" | jq -Rs .)"'"
      }'
done

2.2 Log Keyword Triggers

Monitor system logs for anomalies, with automatic notification and analysis:

#!/bin/bash
# /usr/local/bin/openclaw-log-monitor.sh

LOG_FILE="/var/log/syslog"
KEYWORDS="error|critical|failure|out of memory"

tail -F "$LOG_FILE" | grep --line-buffered -iE "$KEYWORDS" | while read logline; do
    # Alert storm prevention: send at most once per minute
    CURRENT_MINUTE=$(date +%Y%m%d%H%M)
    if [ "$CURRENT_MINUTE" != "$LAST_ALERT_MINUTE" ]; then
        curl -sf -X POST http://localhost:18789/api/v1/send \
          -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
          -d '{
            "channel": "telegram",
            "chatId": "ADMIN_CHAT_ID",
            "message": "⚠️ System log anomaly:\n'"$(echo "$logline" | head -c 500)"'\n\nPlease analyze the possible causes and recommend a course of action."
          }'
        LAST_ALERT_MINUTE="$CURRENT_MINUTE"
    fi
done

3. Webhook Receiver

3.1 OpenClaw Built-In Webhook Support

OpenClaw Gateway can receive external Webhooks and trigger corresponding actions:

// ~/.config/openclaw/openclaw.json5
{
  "webhooks": {
    "enabled": true,
    "port": 18789,
    "endpoints": {
      "/webhook/github": {
        "secret": "your-webhook-secret",
        "action": "notify",
        "channel": "telegram",
        "chatId": "GROUP_CHAT_ID",
        "template": "GitHub event: {{event}} - {{payload.action}}"
      },
      "/webhook/custom": {
        "action": "process",
        "handler": "custom-webhook-skill"
      }
    }
  }
}

3.2 GitHub Webhook Integration

After setting up a Webhook in your GitHub repository, OpenClaw can receive push notifications:

# Test Webhook reception
curl -X POST http://localhost:18789/webhook/github \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -H "X-Hub-Signature-256: sha256=..." \
  -d '{
    "action": "opened",
    "pull_request": {
      "title": "Fix login bug",
      "body": "Fixes the timeout issue on login page",
      "user": {"login": "developer1"}
    }
  }'

3.3 Custom Webhook Skill

Create a skill file to handle Webhooks:

<!-- ~/.openclaw/skills/webhook-handler.SKILL.md -->
# Webhook Handler

When you receive an external Webhook notification, you should:

1. Parse the Webhook content
2. Extract key information
3. Provide a concise summary
4. If it is an urgent event, mark it as "URGENT"

## Supported Webhook Types
- GitHub (PR, Issue, Push)
- Monitoring alerts (server status)
- Custom business events

4. n8n Integration

n8n is a powerful open-source workflow automation tool that integrates deeply with OpenClaw.

4.1 Installing n8n

# Install n8n via Docker
docker run -d \
  --name n8n \
  --restart=always \
  -p 5678:5678 \
  -v n8n_data:/home/node/.n8n \
  n8nio/n8n

4.2 n8n Workflow Calling OpenClaw

Create an HTTP Request node in n8n to connect to OpenClaw:

{
  "nodes": [
    {
      "name": "Schedule Trigger",
      "type": "n8n-nodes-base.scheduleTrigger",
      "parameters": {
        "rule": {
          "interval": [{"field": "hours", "hoursInterval": 1}]
        }
      }
    },
    {
      "name": "Call OpenClaw",
      "type": "n8n-nodes-base.httpRequest",
      "parameters": {
        "url": "http://localhost:18789/api/v1/chat",
        "method": "POST",
        "body": {
          "message": "Check system status for the past hour and generate a report",
          "channel": "internal"
        }
      }
    },
    {
      "name": "Send to Slack",
      "type": "n8n-nodes-base.slack",
      "parameters": {
        "channel": "#ops-alerts",
        "text": "="
      }
    }
  ]
}

4.3 Common n8n + OpenClaw Workflows

5. Make (Integromat) Integration

Make provides a more intuitive visual interface for building workflows.

5.1 Creating an OpenClaw API Module

Connect OpenClaw using an HTTP module in Make:

Trigger (Schedule/Webhook)
    ↓
HTTP Module → POST http://your-server:18789/api/v1/chat
    ↓
Parse Response (JSON Parse)
    ↓
Send Result (Email/Slack/Telegram)

6. Practical Workflow Examples

6.1 Automated Daily Summary

Automatically summarize all channel conversations at 6:00 PM every day and generate a daily report:

#!/bin/bash
# /usr/local/bin/openclaw-daily-summary.sh

# Get today's conversation statistics
STATS=$(curl -sf http://localhost:18789/api/v1/stats/today)

# Ask OpenClaw to generate a summary
curl -sf -X POST http://localhost:18789/api/v1/chat \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "channel": "telegram",
    "chatId": "ADMIN_CHAT_ID",
    "message": "Please generate a daily report summary based on the following statistics:\n\n'"$STATS"'\n\nFormat: 1. Overall overview 2. Hot topics 3. Items requiring attention",
    "systemPrompt": "You are a professional data analyst, skilled at extracting valuable insights from chat data."
  }'

6.2 Content Monitoring and Alerting

Monitor specific websites for content changes and notify users when updates are detected:

#!/bin/bash
# /usr/local/bin/openclaw-content-monitor.sh

URLS=(
    "https://example.com/api/announcements"
    "https://status.anthropic.com/api/v2/summary.json"
)
CACHE_DIR="/tmp/openclaw-monitor"
mkdir -p "$CACHE_DIR"

for url in "${URLS[@]}"; do
    HASH_FILE="$CACHE_DIR/$(echo "$url" | md5sum | cut -d' ' -f1)"
    CURRENT_CONTENT=$(curl -sf "$url")
    CURRENT_HASH=$(echo "$CURRENT_CONTENT" | md5sum | cut -d' ' -f1)

    if [ -f "$HASH_FILE" ]; then
        OLD_HASH=$(cat "$HASH_FILE")
        if [ "$CURRENT_HASH" != "$OLD_HASH" ]; then
            echo "[$(date)] Content change detected: $url"
            # Notify OpenClaw to analyze the change
            curl -sf -X POST http://localhost:18789/api/v1/send \
              -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
              -d '{
                "channel": "telegram",
                "chatId": "ADMIN_CHAT_ID",
                "message": "Content change detected:\nURL: '"$url"'\n\nNew content summary:\n'"$(echo "$CURRENT_CONTENT" | head -c 2000)"'"
              }'
        fi
    fi

    echo "$CURRENT_HASH" > "$HASH_FILE"
done

# Check every 30 minutes
# */30 * * * * /usr/local/bin/openclaw-content-monitor.sh

6.3 Multi-Channel Message Sync

Automatically forward important messages from one channel to others:

// ~/.config/openclaw/openclaw.json5
{
  "automation": {
    "messageForwarding": {
      "rules": [
        {
          "from": {"channel": "telegram", "chatId": "GROUP_A"},
          "to": [
            {"channel": "discord", "chatId": "CHANNEL_ID"},
            {"channel": "slack", "chatId": "#general"}
          ],
          "filter": {
            "keywords": ["announcement", "important", "urgent"],
            "fromUsers": ["admin"]
          }
        }
      ]
    }
  }
}

7. Workflow Debugging Tips

7.1 Log Inspection

# View automation-related logs
openclaw logs | grep -i "automation\|webhook\|cron\|schedule"

# Test API calls
curl -v -X POST http://localhost:18789/api/v1/chat \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"message":"test","channel":"internal"}'

7.2 Common Issues

8. Security Considerations

1. Webhook signature verification: Enable a Webhook Secret to prevent forged requests
2. API authentication: Set an authentication Token for the OpenClaw API
3. Input sanitization: Clean external inputs to prevent prompt injection
4. Rate limiting: Set reasonable execution frequencies for automation tasks
5. Audit logging: Log all automated actions for post-hoc review

With these approaches, you can turn OpenClaw into a powerful automation workflow hub, dramatically boosting your productivity.