Beginner Free 11 hours

OpenClaw Fundamentals: Tools, Memory, and Agent Loops

Agent loops, tools, memory, models, channels, and reliability.

A rigorous beginner course on OpenClaw installation, observe-think-act execution, tools and skills, sessions, memory, models, channels, routing, and basic reliability. The curriculum is grounded in the curated technical references and preserves their technical depth, code, diagrams, decision rules, and failure analysis. Every lesson adds objectives, an applied lab, review questions, and concrete completion evidence. The course closes with a substantial capstone: Build a channel-connected OpenClaw assistant with one bounded tool, durable memory, routing rules, and failure tests.

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What you will learn

Leave with a working mental model.

  1. 01 Explain the OpenClaw runtime, agent lifecycle, and channel gateway
  2. 02 Configure and run a tool-using agent
  3. 03 Separate context, sessions, and durable memory
  4. 04 Add validation, limits, tracing, and basic guardrails

Before you begin

Prerequisites

  • Command-line familiarity
  • Basic scripting
  • Access to a compatible model provider

Curriculum

Course contents

7 modules · 22 lessons

01 Module 1: What OpenClaw Is 3 lessons
  1. 01 OpenClaw Overview and Mental Model Preview
  2. 02 OpenClaw Agent Framework vs LLM Wrapper Preview
  3. 03 OpenClaw Core Concepts
02 Module 2: The Agent Loop 3 lessons
  1. 01 OpenClaw Observe Think Act Loop
  2. 02 OpenClaw Agent Lifecycle
  3. 03 OpenClaw State and Sessions
03 Module 3: Setup and First Agent 3 lessons
  1. 01 OpenClaw Installation and Setup
  2. 02 OpenClaw First Agent
  3. 03 OpenClaw Configuration Files
04 Module 4: Tools, Skills, and Memory 3 lessons
  1. 01 OpenClaw Tools and Skills
  2. 02 OpenClaw Tool Calling and Validation
  3. 03 OpenClaw Memory Systems
05 Module 5: Models, Channels, and Routing 3 lessons
  1. 01 OpenClaw Models and Providers
  2. 02 OpenClaw Channels and Gateway
  3. 03 OpenClaw Multi-Agent Routing
06 Module 6: Building Reliable Agents 5 lessons
  1. 01 OpenClaw Prompt and Instruction Design
  2. 02 OpenClaw Testing and Evaluation
  3. 03 OpenClaw Safety Sandboxing and Guardrails
  4. 04 OpenClaw Common Pitfalls
  5. 05 OpenClaw Capstone Projects
07 Module 7: Capstone Studio 2 lessons
  1. 01 Capstone Brief and Architecture
  2. 02 Validation, Review, and Definition of Done