openclaw-lighthouse

Gateway health check fails with 1006 on root VPS (systemctl --user unavailable)

Problem

On a fresh VPS install (running as root), OpenClaw appears installed, but channel checks fail with:

In many cases, status output also shows:

Why this happens

There are two common causes in this setup:

  1. User systemd bus is unavailable for root session
    • openclaw gateway restart relies on service manager lifecycle (systemctl --user on Linux user-service mode).
    • On some root VPS sessions, that bus does not exist.
  2. Mixed launch modes cause collisions
    • Running both service mode and tmux/foreground mode on the same port causes:
    • gateway already running
    • port 18789 is already in use

Step-by-step fix

Use one mode only. For root VPS environments, tmux mode is the most reliable quick path.

Quick recovery command (root VPS, latest OpenClaw)

If gateway is flaky/unreachable after install or update, this is the fastest restart pattern:

tmux kill-session -t openclaw 2>/dev/null || true
tmux new -d -s openclaw 'openclaw gateway run --port 18789'

One-line form:

tmux kill-session -t openclaw 2>/dev/null || true; tmux new -d -s openclaw 'openclaw gateway run --port 18789'

1) Remove duplicate Feishu plugin copy (if present)

If you installed Feishu manually and also have bundled Feishu, remove the extra local copy:

rm -rf ~/.openclaw/extensions/feishu

2) Pin plugin allowlist

Set explicit trusted plugin ids:

openclaw config set plugins.allow '["feishu"]'

3) Stop service-mode launcher (avoid dual-run)

openclaw gateway stop 2>/dev/null || true
systemctl --user disable --now openclaw-gateway.service 2>/dev/null || true

4) Start gateway in tmux (supervisor mode)

Install tmux if needed:

command -v tmux >/dev/null || (apt-get update && apt-get install -y tmux)

Start OpenClaw gateway in background tmux session:

tmux kill-session -t openclaw 2>/dev/null || true
tmux new -d -s openclaw 'openclaw gateway run --port 18789'

5) Verify runtime and channel health

openclaw gateway status
openclaw channels status --probe

Expected:

Note for tmux mode:

Optional checks if it still fails

A) Read file logs directly (no RPC dependency)

LOG=$(ls -t /tmp/openclaw/openclaw-*.log | head -1)
tail -n 200 "$LOG"

B) Check common fatal markers

LOG=$(ls -t /tmp/openclaw/openclaw-*.log | head -1)
grep -Ei 'failed before reply|all models failed|no available auth profile|rate_limit|no api key|pairing|allowlist|unauthorized|telegram|feishu' "$LOG" | tail -n 40

C) tmux basics

Validation

Field evidence (redacted transcript)

root@<vps>:~/.openclaw# openclaw gateway stop 2>/dev/null || true
... Stopped systemd service: openclaw-gateway.service

root@<vps>:~/.openclaw# systemctl --user disable --now openclaw-gateway.service 2>/dev/null || true

root@<vps>:~/.openclaw# command -v tmux >/dev/null || (apt-get update && apt-get install -y tmux)

root@<vps>:~/.openclaw# tmux kill-session -t openclaw 2>/dev/null || true
root@<vps>:~/.openclaw# tmux new -d -s openclaw 'openclaw gateway run --port 18789'

root@<vps>:~/.openclaw# openclaw gateway status
... Service: systemd (disabled)
... RPC probe: ok
... Listening: 127.0.0.1:18789

root@<vps>:~/.openclaw# openclaw channels status --probe
... Gateway reachable.
... Telegram default: enabled, configured, running, mode:polling, bot:@<telegram_bot>, token:config, works

Security notes

Upstream status

References

Credits