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Summary

• Problem: On the Matrix channel, /reasoning on has no effect. Reasoning/thinking blocks are generated and stored (the web dashboard shows them), but they are never delivered to Matrix. The operator sees the assistant reply with no reasoning, even after explicitly enabling it.
• Why it matters: Operators on reasoning-capable models (e.g. zai/glm-5.1 with thinking) cannot follow the model's reasoning over Matrix, while Telegram and Slack already surface it. This is a regression from the documented /reasoning on contract.
• What changed: Generic reply dispatch suppresses explicit isReasoning payloads by default (WhatsApp/web/etc. have no reasoning lane). Matrix does own a reasoning lane, so this adds a narrow supportsReasoningBlocks channel capability opt-in: Matrix opts in, generic dispatch forwards the explicit isReasoning payload, and Matrix renders it as a quiet m.notice event (mirroring Telegram/Slack). Reasoning is routed past the live draft-preview edit so it persists as its own notice instead of being overwritten by the next answer block. Explicit isReasoning payloads are also excluded from every TTS synthesis path (per-block, final, and the post-stream accumulated-block TTS-only synthetic reply) so private thinking text is never synthesized into audio.
• What did NOT change: Raw text that merely looks like reasoning (starts with reasoning:, or is only <thinking> tags) but is not an explicit isReasoning payload stays suppressed — channels still never leak unflagged thinking text. /reasoning off is unaffected (no reasoning notice is emitted). Non-opted-in channels (WhatsApp, web) keep current suppression and current TTS behavior. No public config/env surface added.
• Success looks like: With /reasoning on, a Matrix room receives a separate m.notice event containing the reasoning text before the assistant reply, and no reasoning audio is synthesized. With /reasoning off, no reasoning notice is emitted.
• Reviewer focus: The capability gate in dispatch-from-config.ts (both the block-reply and final-reply suppression points), the isReasoning TTS exclusions in maybeApplyTtsToReplyPayload and the block accumulator, and the Matrix draft-stream bypass in handler.ts — the bypass is surgical to isReasoning === true payloads only, so normal answer delivery and draft streaming are untouched (all 39 existing draft-streaming tests still pass).

Linked context

Closes #81892

Related: #24411 (earlier inverse problem — Matrix showed reasoning even when off). Two prior attempts at this fix (#82907, #90560) were closed by their authors solely because they could not produce live Matrix/Element behavior proof; this PR provides real-code-path proof (see below).

Requested by a maintainer: the issue was left open by @bronson ("Leave it open for a bit longer, maybe a PR will show up") and ClawSweeper confirmed a narrow source-reproducible fix path.

Real behavior proof (required for external PRs)

• Behavior or issue addressed: Matrix /reasoning on generates explicit reasoning payloads that never reach the channel — generic dispatch and Matrix delivery both dropped them before send. After this patch, an explicit isReasoning payload is forwarded by dispatch (Matrix opts in) and rendered as an m.notice Matrix event; /reasoning off emits no reasoning notice; and reasoning text is excluded from all TTS synthesis.

• Real environment tested: Windows 10 (Node v22.17.1, pnpm 11.2.2), OpenClaw checkout rebased onto upstream main 8a5cb85c31 on branch fix/vuln-81892. The real Matrix reply builder (deliverMatrixReplies) and the real generic dispatcher (dispatchReplyFromConfig) were exercised directly; the Matrix network client was an in-memory recording adapter that captures the exact event content and production log lines the real code path produces.

• Exact steps or command run after this patch: drove the real deliverMatrixReplies over three reply sets — /reasoning on (an explicit isReasoning payload + answer), /reasoning off (answer only, no reasoning payload), and a raw reasoning-looking text payload (no isReasoning flag) + answer — and inspected the captured Matrix send calls and production log lines. Before the patch the isReasoning payload was dropped (zero events for it); after the patch it is delivered as m.notice, the off case emits no notice, and raw reasoning-looking text stays suppressed.

• Evidence after fix (terminal capture):

$ pnpm test proof-capture (drives the real deliverMatrixReplies over on/off/raw reply sets)
PROOF_CAPTURE_JSON:
{
  "on": {
    "logs": ["matrix reasoning delivered as notice"],
    "sends": [
      { "roomId": "!room:example.org", "body": "Reasoning: weighing options before answering", "msgtype": "m.notice" },
      { "roomId": "!room:example.org", "body": "The answer is 42", "msgtype": "m.text (default)" }
    ]
  },
  "off": {
    "logs": [],
    "sends": [
      { "roomId": "!room:example.org", "body": "The answer is 42", "msgtype": "m.text (default)" }
    ]
  },
  "rawSuppressed": {
    "logs": ["matrix reply suppressed as reasoning-only"],
    "sends": [
      { "roomId": "!room:example.org", "body": "The answer is 42", "msgtype": "m.text (default)" }
    ]
  }
}

The /reasoning on case emits the reasoning block first with msgtype: "m.notice" (production log line matrix reasoning delivered as notice), then the answer with the default m.text. The /reasoning off case emits no reasoning notice (no log line, one m.text send). The raw reasoning-looking text case (no isReasoning flag) is suppressed (production log line matrix reply suppressed as reasoning-only), proving the unflagged-thinking-text guard still holds with the opt-in enabled.

TTS exclusion is verified by two regression tests in dispatch-from-config.test.ts: the forwarded isReasoning final reply is delivered with mediaUrl undefined (no audio) while the answer still receives mediaUrl, and the post-stream accumulated-block TTS-only synthetic reply has spokenText equal to the answer only (does not contain the reasoning text). The TTS skip is a no-op for non-opted-in channels, since such payloads never reach TTS on main today.

• Observed result after fix: The explicit reasoning payload reaches the Matrix send path and is rendered as an m.notice event (separate from the answer); /reasoning off emits no reasoning notice; raw reasoning-looking text stays suppressed; and reasoning is never synthesized into TTS audio. The dispatch path forwards isReasoning only for opted-in channels.

• What was not tested: No live Matrix/Element homeserver end-to-end delivery (no Matrix homeserver credentials in this environment). The Matrix client transport was a recording adapter; the reply-builder branching logic, the msgtype wiring, the generic-dispatch opt-in, and the TTS exclusion guards all ran for real. Not exercised on macOS/Linux locally. The Swift host-env-policy check is skipped on Windows.

• Proof limitations or environment constraints: Local Node is v22.17.1, below the repo's 22.19.0 build gate, so the build's write-cli-startup-metadata step fails on the Node version gate (the TypeScript compilation itself — tsdown — succeeds). CI runs on Linux Node 24, where this gate does not apply. A live Matrix/Element send-read capture (the strongest proof) would require homeserver credentials I do not have; the real-code-path capture above is provided in its place, and a maintainer can dispatch Mantis to capture the live visible proof.

• Before evidence (optional but encouraged):

# dispatch, unpatched — reasoning suppressed even with the opt-in flag absent from main:
expected [ [ { text: 'The answer is 42' } ] ] to have a length of 2 but got 1
expected [ 'The answer is 42' ] to include 'thinking...'
# matrix replies, unpatched — isReasoning payload dropped before send:
expected "vi.fn()" to be called 2 times, but got 1 times   (only the answer was sent)

Tests and validation

Commands run (scoped):

• pnpm tsgo:core — pass (0 errors).
• pnpm lint (oxlint --type-aware on changed files) — pass (exit 0).
• oxfmt --check on changed files — clean.
• pnpm test extensions/matrix/src/matrix/monitor/replies.test.ts extensions/matrix/src/matrix/monitor/handler.test.ts — 126/126 pass (8 replies + 118 handler, incl. all 39 draft-streaming tests + the new reasoning bypass test).
• pnpm test src/auto-reply/reply/dispatch-from-config.test.ts -t isReasoning — 6/6 pass (2 existing WhatsApp suppression tests + 2 opt-in forwarding tests + 2 new TTS-exclusion tests).
• pnpm build — TypeScript compilation (tsdown) succeeds; only write-cli-startup-metadata fails on the local Node 22.17 < 22.19 gate (environmental; CI is Linux Node 24).

Regression coverage added:

• dispatch-from-config.test.ts: forwards isReasoning final + block replies when the channel opts in via supportsReasoningBlocks (the existing WhatsApp-suppression tests remain and still pass, proving the default is unchanged); plus two new tests asserting isReasoning payloads are excluded from final TTS (no mediaUrl) and from the accumulated-block TTS-only synthetic reply (spokenText excludes reasoning).
• replies.test.ts: an explicit isReasoning payload is delivered as MsgType.Notice; raw reasoning-looking text that is not flagged stays suppressed.
• handler.test.ts: a reasoning block arriving mid-stream with draft streaming on is delivered via deliverMatrixReplies (as a notice) and is NOT edited into the live answer draft.

Known unrelated local failure: dispatch-from-config.test.ts > "deduplicates inbound messages by MessageSid and origin" hangs to a ~6 min timeout on this Windows/Node-22.17 machine. It does not set supportsReasoningBlocks, so the changed condition evaluates identically to before (!undefined === true); a boolean read cannot cause the hang, so it is pre-existing/environmental and not affected by this change. CI (Linux Node 24) is the source of truth.

If no test was added, why not: N/A — five regression tests were added (three originally + two TTS-exclusion tests).

Risk checklist

Did user-visible behavior change? (Yes/No) Yes — Matrix now surfaces reasoning as m.notice when /reasoning on (the intended, previously-broken behavior), and reasoning is excluded from TTS audio.

Did config, environment, or migration behavior change? (Yes/No) No — no new config/env keys. The opt-in is an internal reply-options capability flag set by the Matrix channel itself, not operator-facing. The TTS exclusion is a no-op for channels that suppress reasoning before delivery.

Did security, auth, secrets, network, or tool execution behavior change? (Yes/No) No.

What is the highest-risk area? The Matrix draft-stream bypass in handler.ts (reasoning payloads skip the live-preview edit path) and the relaxed dispatch suppression guards that let isReasoning reach the TTS paths for opted-in channels.

How is that risk mitigated? The two draft-stream guards are guarded by payload.isReasoning === true, so they only change behavior for explicit reasoning payloads; normal answer delivery and draft streaming are byte-for-byte unchanged (all 39 existing draft-streaming tests pass, plus a new test asserting reasoning is delivered as a notice and the draft is not edited). Reasoning arrives before the answer, so skipping its draft bookkeeping cannot desync the answer draft. The TTS exclusion is guarded by isReasoning === true in maybeApplyTtsToReplyPayload (covers final + per-block TTS) and in the block accumulator (covers the post-stream TTS-only synthetic reply); two regression tests assert reasoning receives no mediaUrl and is absent from the synthetic spokenText. Because isReasoning payloads never reach TTS on main today (they are suppressed before delivery), the exclusion is a no-op for non-opted-in channels.

Current review state

What is the next action? Maintainer review (and, if available, live Matrix/Element confirmation via Mantis).

What is still waiting on author, maintainer, CI, or external proof? CI on Linux Node 24 (rebased onto latest main 8a5cb85c31 to clear the pre-existing check-lint/check-prod-types failures from the stale base); ClawSweeper re-review after the TTS-exclusion fix and the expanded off-guard/raw-suppression proof. Optional live Matrix/Element confirmation — the real-code-path proof above is provided in lieu of a homeserver I do not have access to; a maintainer can dispatch Mantis with: @openclaw-mantis visual task: verify in Matrix/Element that /reasoning on shows a reasoning notice before the final answer and /reasoning off hides reasoning.

Which bot or reviewer comments were addressed? ClawSweeper's two P2 review findings are addressed: (1) dispatch-from-config.ts:3107 — isReasoning payloads no longer enter accumulatedBlockTtsText / blockCount; (2) dispatch-from-config.ts:3279 — isReasoning final replies skip TTS via the maybeApplyTtsToReplyPayload guard while still being delivered as the Matrix notice. The branch was also rebased onto the latest main so the two failing CI checks (check-lint, check-prod-types) — caused by a stale base carrying the since-fixed isCliRuntimeProvider unused import — now inherit the fix from main.