openclaw - 💡(How to fix) Fix Workspace hooks rejected as "cannot override openclaw-managed hook code" and replaced with empty managed versions (2026.4.23+) [1 participants]

Summary

On openclaw 2026.4.23 and 2026.4.24 (macOS), all workspace-defined hooks are silently rejected at gateway startup with the message:

[hooks/workspace] Ignoring openclaw-workspace hook "<name>" because it cannot override openclaw-managed hook code

openclaw then loads its own internal versions of the same-named hooks, but those internal versions have no events defined in metadata, meaning the workspace hooks are not just overridden — they're effectively replaced with no-ops. The custom logic in the workspace hook files never runs.

Environment

• openclaw version: 2026.4.23 (also reproduced on 2026.4.24)
• OS: macOS (Mac mini M4, Darwin)
• Node: v25.9.0
• Service: LaunchAgent (ai.openclaw.gateway.plist)
• Workspace: ~/clawd with hooks defined under workspace's hook configuration

Affected hooks

All 9 of our workspace's "Goldfish Brain" hooks are being rejected:

1. cognitive-compressor
2. compaction-protocol-pin
3. compliance-logger
4. memory-arbiter
5. memory-lifecycle
6. protocol-injector
7. protocol-validators
8. semantic-protocol
9. workflow-checkpoint

These hooks share names with openclaw-managed hooks, and the gateway appears to be refusing to allow workspace versions to override them.

Log evidence

At gateway startup on 2026.4.23 (post-rollback from 4.24, fresh restart):

2026-04-26T17:29:32.260-04:00 [hooks/workspace] Ignoring openclaw-workspace hook "cognitive-compressor" because it cannot override openclaw-managed hook code
2026-04-26T17:29:32.261-04:00 [hooks/workspace] Ignoring openclaw-workspace hook "compaction-protocol-pin" because it cannot override openclaw-managed hook code
2026-04-26T17:29:32.261-04:00 [hooks/workspace] Ignoring openclaw-workspace hook "compliance-logger" because it cannot override openclaw-managed hook code
2026-04-26T17:29:32.261-04:00 [hooks/workspace] Ignoring openclaw-workspace hook "memory-arbiter" because it cannot override openclaw-managed hook code
2026-04-26T17:29:32.261-04:00 [hooks/workspace] Ignoring openclaw-workspace hook "memory-lifecycle" because it cannot override openclaw-managed hook code
2026-04-26T17:29:32.262-04:00 [hooks/workspace] Ignoring openclaw-workspace hook "protocol-injector" because it cannot override openclaw-managed hook code
2026-04-26T17:29:32.262-04:00 [hooks/workspace] Ignoring openclaw-workspace hook "protocol-validators" because it cannot override openclaw-managed hook code
2026-04-26T17:29:32.262-04:00 [hooks/workspace] Ignoring openclaw-workspace hook "semantic-protocol" because it cannot override openclaw-managed hook code
2026-04-26T17:29:32.262-04:00 [hooks/workspace] Ignoring openclaw-workspace hook "workflow-checkpoint" because it cannot override openclaw-managed hook code

Immediately followed by:

2026-04-26T17:29:32.275-04:00 [hooks:loader] Loading managed hook code into the gateway process. Managed hooks are trusted local code.
2026-04-26T17:29:32.306-04:00 [hooks:loader] Hook 'cognitive-compressor' has no events defined in metadata
2026-04-26T17:29:32.316-04:00 [hooks:loader] Hook 'memory-arbiter' has no events defined in metadata
2026-04-26T17:29:32.318-04:00 [hooks:loader] Hook 'memory-lifecycle' has no events defined in metadata
2026-04-26T17:29:32.321-04:00 [hooks:loader] Hook 'protocol-validators' has no events defined in metadata

So the gateway:

1. Sees workspace versions of these hooks → rejects them
2. Loads its own managed versions instead
3. Several of the managed versions have no events configured → effective no-op

Source location (from log metadata): dist/subsystem-bmJ5rL4Q.js:338

Impact

The workspace hooks contain custom logic for compaction handling, memory lifecycle, semantic protocols, and workflow checkpoints. Silent rejection means:

• No error or warning surfaced to user beyond the log line
• openclaw status and similar commands report no hook problems
• Workspace appears to be "working" but custom guardrails aren't running
• Combined with #71325/#60858 (compaction safeguard hot loop), workspace's compaction-protocol-pin hook — which was specifically intended to mitigate that loop — is silently disabled

Versions tested

• 2026.4.23: rejection occurs ✗
• 2026.4.24: rejection occurs ✗

I rolled back from 4.24 → 4.23 today initially thinking this was tied to the 4.24 Bonjour Ciao crash (#71869). Confirmed today via post-rollback logs that the hook rejection persists on 4.23, so it's not version-specific to 4.24 — possibly introduced earlier in the 2026.4.x series.

Suggested investigation

• What determines whether a workspace hook "can override" a managed hook? Is there a metadata flag (e.g. overridable: true on the managed hook) we should be looking for?
• If shadowing managed hook names is intentionally disallowed, the workspace hook loader should fail loudly (status command, dashboard surfacing) rather than only logging at WARN level on cold start.
• If managed hooks have no events defined, they shouldn't take priority over workspace hooks that do — or at minimum, that combination should produce an actionable error so the user can rename the workspace hook.

Happy to provide a dump of one of the workspace hook files (semantic-protocol.js etc.) if useful for repro.