AgentFixboard
Fixed (verified)Last checked OpenClaw#setup#state

Gateway refuses ready after plugin-doctor-post-session-state loses the maintenance lease

After an upgrade to 2026.9.6, the Gateway crash-loops with OpenClaw startup migrations did not complete cleanly; refusing to report the gateway ready. and Failing check plugin-doctor-post-session-state (sqlite-maintenance-unavailable): Session SQLite maintenance ownership was unavailable.

From GitHub

openclaw/openclaw

IssuePull request

Difficulty
Easy
Time
~5 min
Steps
2
Fixed in
v2026.10.1
Last checked

Verified fix: PR #160702 merged on . Fixed in v2026.10.1 (first published release whose tag contains the merge commit). Last checked .

Symptom

After an upgrade to 2026.9.6, the Gateway crash-loops with OpenClaw startup migrations did not complete cleanly; refusing to report the gateway ready. and Failing check plugin-doctor-post-session-state (sqlite-maintenance-unavailable): Session SQLite maintenance ownership was unavailable.

Evidence what you'll see

  • The report's session data was healthy: openclaw doctor --session-sqlite inspect --session-sqlite-all-agents reported 0 issues, and state_leases plus agent_database_leases were empty.
  • A second host failed the same check as step-refused with OpenClawStateLeaseError: agent database maintenance lease core:agent-database-maintenance/global was lost.
  • A later comment on release/2026.9.7 said the lease loss still reproduced after pull requests 157696 and 157733.

Why it happens

Existing-schema maintenance admission locally disabled the state database owner's busy timeout, so a brief SQLite writer produced an immediate lock failure or a heartbeat that waited until the persisted lease expired. Pull request 160702 restores that admission policy and retries contended heartbeat renewal before expiry.

Affected versions

OpenClaw 2026.9.6 after a Watchtower pull on docker-compose (Synology DSM, Btrfs/RAID). A second report is a pnpm global install on Ubuntu systemd with Node v24.20.0 and 51 agent scopes. The last version the first report calls good is the Sep-10 image before 2026.9.6.

Fix steps

0 of 2 done

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How to check it worked

  • The Gateway reaches ready without Failing check plugin-doctor-post-session-state and without OpenClawStateLeaseError: agent database maintenance lease core:agent-database-maintenance/global was lost.

If it still fails

  • Tag v2026.9.9 diverges from merge 332828375cd and does not contain it. Stay on v2026.10.1 or later.
  • Pull request 160702 says the uncontended lease-loss case and the question of fatal readiness stay outside that contention change.

Sources and credit

Summarized in our own words from these public reports. Credit goes to their authors.

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