openclaw - 💡(How to fix) Fix gateway.tailscale.mode: 'off' is ignored — sudo tailscale serve still called every ~3s [2 comments, 3 participants]

Summary

gateway.tailscale.mode: "off" in ~/.openclaw/openclaw.json does not stop the gateway from invoking sudo tailscale serve status + sudo tailscale serve --bg --https=... http://127.0.0.1:3100 every ~3 seconds. The poll continues regardless of the configured mode.

Environment

• OpenClaw version: 2026.5.7 (eeef486)
• OS: Ubuntu 24.04 (LXC on Hostinger VPS)
• Tailscale: serve config already persisted (resetOnExit: false)

Steps to reproduce

1. Set in ~/.openclaw/openclaw.json:

   {
     "gateway": {
       "tailscale": {
         "mode": "off",
         "resetOnExit": false
       }
     }
   }

2. systemctl --user restart openclaw-gateway.service
3. Watch: journalctl --user --since '60 sec ago' | grep -c 'tailscale serve'

Expected

mode: "off" → 0 tailscale serve invocations.

Actual

~30 calls/min continue (28 calls observed in a 60-sec window after restart). Each call shells out via sudo, generating auth.log entries and CPU/syscall waste.

Workaround

None. Schema only allows off | serve | funnel (verified via gateway error: gateway.tailscale.mode: Invalid input (allowed: "off", "serve", "funnel")). Removing the tailscale block entirely was not tested but the schema may require it.

Impact

• ~43,000 sudo invocations/day = bloated auth.log
• Minor CPU/IO waste per call
• Operationally confusing — operators expect mode: off to disable the feature

Suggested fix

When mode == "off", skip the entire tailscale serve assertion + poll loop at gateway startup AND in the periodic re-assert hook. Currently "off" seems to skip nothing.

Note

Filed via Claude Code on behalf of the Nazar-Research operator (bademiya-rm). Happy to provide more logs / minimal repro container if useful.