---
title: Persistent memory for OpenClaw, on your own machine
slug: semurg-memory-for-openclaw
date: 2026-10-25
author: Semurg
section: how-to
tags: [openclaw, mcp, agents, memory, how-to]
summary: Give OpenClaw a memory that outlives the session, on your own disk, with one registry command, the token kept as a reference, and a live probe that needs no model.
status: published
covers: [route:POST /v1/mcp, route:GET /v1/memory/status, mcp:memory_status, mcp:memory_remember, mcp:memory_recall, mcp:memory_context, mcp:memory_relate, mcp:memory_forget, mcp:memory_document]
constants: [24.04]
---
> Tested with OpenClaw `2026.10.7`: OpenClaw's own MCP client connected to the node and listed every memory tool it serves. The [agents page](/agents#openclaw) shows the release it last ran on.

OpenClaw starts each session without what it learned in the last one. This guide adds a memory it asks instead of forgets: a Semurg node
on your own machine, which OpenClaw reaches over MCP after one registry command. Facts stay on your disk, come back cited to where they
were said, and are shared with every other agent on the node that uses the same scope.

> Diagram openclaw-memory: OpenClaw keeps one MCP server entry that holds a reference to your token; it reaches your node, which keeps the memory in the scope you named on your own disk; a later session or another agent on the same scope reads it back, cited.

## What you need

- An Intel or AMD x86_64 machine with Ubuntu 24.04, on Linux directly or on Windows through WSL2. One node is free, with no licence key.
- OpenClaw on the same machine. Its installer needs `curl`, `git`, `ca-certificates`, `tar` and `xz-utils`; we test both in a fresh `ubuntu:24.04` container.

## Step one: install a node

On Ubuntu 24.04 (x86_64), with sudo:

```bash
curl -fsSL https://one.semurg.io/install | sudo bash
```

The [install page](/install) lists what the installer needs and what it changes. The installer ends by printing your API token, and the
node keeps a copy. Put it in a file only you can read, and have every new terminal load it:

```bash
mkdir -p ~/.config/semurg
(umask 077; sudo grep '^SEMURG_API_TOKEN=' /etc/semurg/semurg.env | cut -d= -f2- > ~/.config/semurg/token)
echo 'export SEMURG_API_TOKEN="$(cat ~/.config/semurg/token)"' >> ~/.bashrc
export SEMURG_API_TOKEN="$(cat ~/.config/semurg/token)"
```

## Step two: install OpenClaw

OpenClaw installs itself with its own installer, the line the [agents page](/agents#openclaw) shows. The MCP commands below work without
its onboarding and without a running gateway.

```bash
curl -fsSL https://openclaw.ai/install.sh | bash -s -- --no-onboard
```

## Step three: connect

Register the node and probe it, exactly as the agents page shows. The single quotes matter: they keep `${SEMURG_API_TOKEN}` as a
reference, so OpenClaw stores the reference, never the token, and fills it in from its environment each time it connects.

```bash
openclaw mcp set semurg '{"url":"http://127.0.0.1:4000/v1/mcp","transport":"streamable-http","headers":{"Authorization":"Bearer ${SEMURG_API_TOKEN}","X-Semurg-Scope":"default"}}'
openclaw mcp doctor semurg --probe
```

Change `default` to a scope of your own per project: agents that use the same scope share what they learn.

## Step four: check it, then use it

The probe in step three makes a live connection, which needs no model. To see the tools by name, ask for the probe's JSON:

```bash
openclaw mcp probe semurg --json
```

It names each memory tool, `semurg__memory_status`, `semurg__memory_remember` and so on. OpenClaw then offers them to its model like its
other tools, so you can ask in plain words: "remember that we chose Postgres for billing because of the audit log", and in a later
session, "what did we decide about billing?". We have tested the connection, not a conversation with a model.

To see from outside OpenClaw which of your scopes now hold facts, ask the node directly:

```bash
curl -sS http://127.0.0.1:4000/v1/memory/status \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $SEMURG_API_TOKEN"
```

## The memory tools in OpenClaw

OpenClaw names each tool after the server, `semurg__` followed by the tool's own name:

- `memory_status`: reports whether shared memory is on for this node and which of your scopes hold facts.
- `memory_remember`: stores entities, the relationships between them and the passages they came from, or plain text, with an optional source label and date.
- `memory_recall`: recalls what is stored about one named entity, its own facts first, each item cited.
- `memory_relate`: adds one typed relationship between two entities in a scope, creating an end that is not stored yet.
- `memory_context`: answers a question in plain words with cited items and a verdict on whether the store covers it.
- `memory_document`: takes a whole document (PDF with a text layer, Word, HTML or plain text) and stores it as cited passages in a scope.
- `memory_forget`: deletes one thing per call: an entity and everything that names it, one fact, one document, every document under a source label, or the whole scope. It is unreachable at once and not yet wiped from the disk.
- `memory_export`: reads everything a scope holds, one page per call: send each reply's `next` back as `cursor` until it is empty. The records are the entities, the facts with their dated sources and whether each is current or ended, and each stored document once; a forgotten passage is never exported.
- `memory_import`: stores the records `memory_export` produced into any scope, through the same writes `memory_remember` makes. A page sent twice stores nothing twice, and the reply names every record it skipped.

Every answer says its `state`: `answered`, `nothing_stored` (nothing stored matched, so the agent should say it does not know) or `could_not_judge`.

## Troubleshooting

- The connection is refused: `SEMURG_API_TOKEN` must be set in the environment of every OpenClaw process, the command line and any gateway or background service alike. A service started outside your shell does not read `~/.bashrc`.
- `openclaw mcp doctor` warns about a literal sensitive value: for the `${SEMURG_API_TOKEN}` reference that warning is a false alarm, because the stored entry holds no token.
- Read the probe's tool names, not its exit status: in our tests `openclaw mcp probe` exited with success even when the connection failed, and without `--json` it prints only a count.
- `openclaw: command not found`: where the installer puts the command is not documented. Look in `~/.local/bin`, `/usr/local/bin`, `~/.npm-global/bin` and `~/.openclaw/bin`, and add that folder to your path.

Use `127.0.0.1` rather than `localhost`: on Ubuntu `localhost` can resolve to the IPv6 address first, and the node listens on IPv4 loopback
only.

## Next

- The [agents page](/agents): the configuration for more agents, with the release each was last connected on.
- [Give your agent persistent memory with MCP in five minutes](/blog/agent-memory-mcp-five-minutes): the memory calls over plain HTTP too.
- [Connecting to Semurg over MCP](/blog/connect-over-mcp): the endpoint, the protocol versions it speaks and how a refusal comes back.
- If a step does not work, tell us on the [contact page](/contact), with the reply you got.