openclaw - 💡(How to fix) Fix [UX]: openclaw doctor produces no streamed progress during long-running phases (npm install of bundled plugin runtime deps) [1 comments, 2 participants]

Summary

openclaw doctor (and especially doctor --fix) can run for several minutes with no streamed output. When stdout is captured/piped, no output appears until the process exits or is killed; even on TTY, the long npm-install phase has no spinner or progress text. From the operator's perspective, it's indistinguishable from a hang.

Environment

• OpenClaw 2026.4.24
• Node v25.8.0
• Linux 6.12.0
• IPv4-only network egress (slows npm install)

Observed

A doctor --fix invocation that needs to install ~60 bundled plugin runtime deps:

• TTY mode: clack intro/outro banners print fine, but the npm-install span shows nothing for 3–5 minutes.
• Non-TTY (node ... doctor 2>&1 | tail -40 or shell redirect): zero stdout flushed for the entire run; output is dumped only when the process exits. A SIGTERM to the doctor process flushes buffered output.

I have one observed instance where a doctor (no --fix) ran ~6 minutes due to silently triggering the same npm install path internally; the operator only confirmed it was alive via pgrep and ls on the npm cache _logs/ directory.

Suspected cause

• src/flows/doctor-health.ts uses @clack/prompts intro/outro which render via raw TTY sequences. In non-TTY contexts these are buffered until process exit.
• The bundled-runtime-deps install at src/plugins/bundled-runtime-deps.ts spawnBundledRuntimeDepsInstall (line ~1590) collects child.stdout/child.stderr into buffers (stdout: Buffer[]) and only emits them on close. There is no runtime.log("installing X of Y…") heartbeat while npm runs.
• No spinner is started around the install span, so even on TTY there's no visual signal.

Impact

• Operators can't tell whether doctor is making progress, stalled, or deadlocked.
• In CI/log-capture contexts, no output reaches the log until the run completes — defeats the purpose of running doctor in pipelines.
• Encourages manually killing doctor (and produces zombie processes when piped through tail -N).

Expected

• A spinner or periodic line ("installing bundled plugin runtime deps: package N of M…") during long phases.
• Stream child.stdout/child.stderr from the spawn rather than buffering until close.
• Honor --no-color / OPENCLAW_NON_TTY to switch to a line-based progress mode that flushes per phase.

Proposed fix

1. In spawnBundledRuntimeDepsInstall, switch from buffer-on-close to child.stdout.on('data', chunk => runtime.log?.(chunk.toString())) (gated by a verbose flag if too noisy), or emit runtime.log("installing N specs into <root>") before spawning and runtime.log("installed in Xs") after.
2. Wrap each doctor phase with a clack.spinner so non-completion is visible on TTY.
3. In non-TTY mode, fall back to plain console.log per phase boundary with timestamps so log capture is informative.

Repro

node /path/to/openclaw/dist/index.js doctor 2>&1 | tail -40

For multi-minute installs, observe zero output until process exit.

Reported by @dfpalhano during reliability audit.