ARTA — Agentic Real-Time Awareness

In-memory self-awareness for agents.

⚠️ Current Limitation: This version provides awareness within a single agent process. True cross-instance/cross-agent awareness would require a shared backend (Redis, database, or OpenClaw global API) — not yet implemented.

What is ARTA?

ARTA gives agents awareness of their own activity across sessions within a single process.

Without ARTA:

• Agent is fragmented across sessions
• Each session is isolated
• Can't answer: "What am I doing in other sessions?"

With ARTA:

• Tracks own sessions
• Queryable state
• Can say: "I'm also talking to you in another session"

Core Concepts

1. Agent Instance

A single session of an agent.

{
  "instanceId": "session-abc123",
  "agent": "my-agent",
  "channel": "telegram:CHAT_ID",
  "human": "USER_NAME",
  "task": "discussing ARTA",
  "status": "active"
}

2. Awareness Graph

The state of agent instances:

{
  "agents": {
    "my-agent": {
      "instances": [
        {
          "instanceId": "session-1",
          "channel": "telegram:CHAT_ID_1",
          "task": "discussing ARTA",
          "status": "active"
        },
        {
          "instanceId": "session-2",
          "channel": "discord:CHANNEL_ID",
          "task": "code review",
          "status": "active"
        }
      ]
    }
  }
}

3. Context Broker

The queryable API:

• "What am I doing elsewhere?"
• "What is in channel X?"
• "Who is the human talking to?"

What ARTA Reads from OpenClaw

When running within OpenClaw, ARTA can access:

Note: ARTA reads metadata only — not message content, not credentials, not bot tokens.

Configuration

Option 1: Auto-Configure from OpenClaw

// Auto-detect from OpenClaw context
const channel = process.env.OPENCLAW_CHANNEL || 'unknown';
const chatId = process.env.OPENCLAW_CHAT_ID || 'unknown';
const human = process.env.OPENCLAW_SENDER_NAME || 'unknown';

const channelId = `${channel}:${chatId}`;

Option 2: Environment Variables

# Optional - ARTA will auto-detect from OpenClaw if not set
export ARTA_AGENT_NAME="your-agent-name"
export ARTA_CHANNEL_TYPE="telegram"
export ARTA_CHAT_ID="123456789"
export ARTA_HUMAN_NAME="human-name"

Bot Tokens

ARTA does NOT require bot tokens. The skill works with metadata (channel IDs, user names) only. If you see references to bot tokens in documentation, they are for reference — not required.

Protocol

Register

arta.register({
  instanceId: "session-abc",
  channel: "telegram:CHAT_ID",
  human: "USER_NAME",
  task: "initial task"
});

Update

arta.update({
  instanceId: "session-abc",
  task: "new task",
  status: "active"
});

Query

const otherInstances = arta.queryOtherThan("session-abc");

Leave

arta.leave({
  instanceId: "session-abc"
});

Implementation

class ARTA {
  constructor(agentName) {
    this.agentName = agentName;
    this.instances = new Map();
  }

  register({ instanceId, channel, human, task = 'idle' }) {
    this.instances.set(instanceId, {
      instanceId,
      channel,
      human,
      task,
      status: 'active',
      started: Date.now(),
      lastHeartbeat: Date.now()
    });
  }

  update({ instanceId, task, status = 'active' }) {
    const instance = this.instances.get(instanceId);
    if (instance) {
      instance.task = task;
      instance.status = status;
      instance.lastHeartbeat = Date.now();
    }
  }

  leave({ instanceId }) {
    this.instances.delete(instanceId);
  }

  query() {
    return Array.from(this.instances.values());
  }

  queryOtherThan(instanceId) {
    return this.query().filter(i => i.instanceId !== instanceId);
  }

  queryByChannel(channel) {
    return this.query().filter(i => i.channel === channel);
  }

  queryByHuman(human) {
    return this.query().filter(i => i.human === human);
  }
}

Integration with IBT

// In IBT Observe phase
const otherTasks = arta.queryOtherThan(currentSessionId);
if (otherTasks.length > 0) {
  // Agent is active in other sessions
}

Security & Privacy

What ARTA Reads (from OpenClaw context):

• Channel type and ID (metadata)
• Human name from sender
• Agent name from config

What ARTA Stores (in-memory only):

• Session ID
• Channel identifier
• Human name
• Task description
• Status

What ARTA NEVER Does:

• ❌ Reads bot tokens or credentials
• ❌ Stores credentials
• ❌ Exfiltrates data
• ❌ Makes external network calls
• ❌ Persists data to disk
• ❌ Logs message content
• ❌ Shares data with other agents

Install

clawhub install arta

Version

0.3.0 — Clarified in-memory only limitation, removed bot token requirements, specified metadata-only access