Problem

Every time OpenClaw is updated via npm i -g openclaw@latest, the manually-installed @lancedb/lancedb package gets wiped from node_modules. This has happened 3 times now (Feb 15, 17, 18) and requires manually running:

cd /opt/homebrew/lib/node_modules/openclaw && npm install @lancedb/lancedb

after every update, followed by a gateway restart.

Impact

• Memory search (memory_recall) silently breaks after updates
• No error message indicates the missing dependency — it just stops working
• Easy to miss, leading to degraded agent behavior until someone notices

Environment

• macOS (Apple Silicon / arm64)
• Node v25.5.0
• OpenClaw 2026.2.17
• Installed globally via npm

Suggested Fix

Add @lancedb/lancedb as a declared dependency in OpenClaw's package.json (or as an optional dependency) so it survives npm i -g updates. Alternatively, support a post-update hook (~/.openclaw/hooks/post-update.sh) that runs automatically after gateway restarts from updates.

Workaround

Manually reinstall after each update:

cd /opt/homebrew/lib/node_modules/openclaw && npm install @lancedb/lancedb
openclaw gateway restart