How to set up Clawdbot on Digital Ocean

setup.md

Clawdbot on DigitalOcean

1. Create a Droplet

Ubuntu 24.04 LTS, nearest region

2. Select Premium AMD

2 GB RAM / 1 AMD CPU / 50 GB NVMe

3. SSH into server

ssh root@YOUR_IP

4. Create sudo user

adduser clawd && usermod -aG sudo clawd && su - clawd

5. Install Clawdbot

curl -fsSL https://clawd.bot/install.sh | bash

Then run exec bash

6. Configure API keys

clawdbot setup --wizard

7. Start gateway

clawdbot gateway --bind lan --port 18789

8. SSH tunnel to access UI

ssh -L 18789:127.0.0.1:18789 clawd@YOUR_IP

Open http://127.0.0.1:18789

9. Dashboard

Run clawdbot dashboard if you are trying to connect and can't find the token.

running Anthropic and a Telegram setup on a 1GB droplet will throw out of memory during the NPM install.

What could help:

export NODE_OPTIONS="--max-old-space-size=2048"

Alternatively, you may need to add swap if the above doesn't help:

sudo fallocate -l 2G /swapfile || sudo dd if=/dev/zero of=/swapfile bs=1M count=2048
sudo chmod 600 /swapfile
sudo mkswap /swapfile
sudo swapon /swapfile

echo '/swapfile none swap sw 0 0' | sudo tee -a /etc/fstab

Hi @mpeshev thanks for chiming in, do you think I should just update to mention to provision 2GB instead of 1GB?

@dabit3 2GB is a safer recommendation overall (a higher build), but 2x the cost may be prohibitive to some.

1GB with NODE_OPTIONS seems to bypass the setup limits and works fine for simple tasks after.

clawdbot dashboard is your friend if you are trying to connect and can't find the token

to monkey patch and run gateway in the background without systemd, nohup clawdbot gateway --bind lan --port 18789 > clawdbot.log 2>&1 &

The server setup guide for Clawdbot is fundamentally flawed and potentially dangerous, as it lacks essential security measures necessary to protect users from hacking vulnerabilities. Key omissions include critical steps like upgrading the server software, setting up SSH keys for secure access, closing unnecessary ports, and implementing fail2ban to guard against brute-force attacks. Following this guide without these precautions is akin to leaving your front door wide open, essentially inviting hackers to exploit your system. It is irresponsible to publish such a superficial guide that could mislead countless individuals into compromising their server's security. A thorough understanding of server management and security practices is crucial, and it would be wise for the author to revise the guide significantly or consult with experienced professionals before sharing further.

Curious why you didn't recommend binding gateway to localhost instead?

Bind somehow not working with the public IP address of the VM. I can see bind is for all interfaces with 0.0.0.0 still browser port is not responding, when access directly using public IP address of the VM and port.

Given the uncovered vulnerabilities so far, it's probably best to avoid binding clawd to the public IP of the VM / exposing it directly to the Internet