Summary

Adds capped direct-text subagent completion fallback paths after active requester wake failure and SessionWriteLock handoff errors, so a pure-text subagent completion reaches the direct-message target even when the requester session is inactive, locked, or unreachable.

This PR addresses only the direct-message fallback portion of #92076. The linked issues below cover adjacent but distinct scope that this PR deliberately leaves for separate fixes:

• [Bug]: Session write lock held for entire turn duration causes queued user messages to silently fail #92395 (session write-lock message loss): orphan/session-lock cleanup symptom — out of scope here, the active session-lock reclaim path is independent and tracked separately.
• subagent-announce-delivery: pending direct-announce drops completion notifications across all spawn depths (likely root of #92405) #93323 (pending direct-announce drops across spawn depths): an adjacent completion-delivery loss mode covering deeper spawn depths — out of scope, requires its own routing change.
• #92076: Subagent completion delivery can fail when requester run is inactive and session transcript is locked #92643 (closed, conflicting): prior attempt at the same direct-text fallback, closed in favor of this cleaner PR.

Closing Fixes #92076 here does not hide the remaining lock or routing work; those remain tracked in their own issues.

Changes

• src/agents/subagent-announce-delivery.ts: Two new direct-text fallback call sites:

  1. Proactive — after active requester wake failure (e.g. no_active_run, compacting), if the direct-message target accepts plain text, send the capped completion directly without re-attempting the requester handoff.
  2. Reactive — inside the SessionWriteLock catch block, when the failure is isSessionWriteLockAnnounceAgentError and the direct-message target accepts plain text, send the capped completion directly instead of re-throwing.
     Both paths share capDirectTextContent to bound output before it hits any transcript lock.

• src/agents/subagent-announce-delivery.test.ts:

  • 6 tests for capDirectTextContent covering short text, head/tail preview, custom maxChars, exactly-maxChars edge case, and a regression that locks the accurate omitted-character count.
  • Focused tests for the active-wake-failure and SessionWriteLock direct-text fallback paths, asserting sendMessage receives the capped content and delivered: true is returned.
  • Common setup helper extracted to reduce duplication (setupActiveWakeFailureFixtures).

• scripts/reproduce-92076.ts: A local helper script that exercises capDirectTextContent against the exact long-output case described in Subagent completion delivery can fail when requester run is inactive and session transcript is locked #92076.

Real behavior proof

• Behavior addressed: pure-text subagent completion is lost when the requester session is inactive or holds a SessionWriteLock for the entire turn, because the active-wake failure path and the SessionWriteLock catch only recover generated-media deliverables.
• Real environment tested: Linux x86_64 local checkout, Node 22.19+, pnpm workspace.
• Exact steps or command run after this patch:
  • node scripts/reproduce-92076.ts
  • node scripts/run-vitest.mjs run --config test/vitest/vitest.agents.config.ts src/agents/subagent-announce-delivery.test.ts
• npx oxlint --import-plugin --config .oxlintrc.json src/agents/subagent-announce-delivery.ts src/agents/subantity-announce-delivery.test.ts
• Evidence after fix (reproduction script — terminal output from real Node process):

  Reproduction script for issue #92076
  ============================================================
  
  capDirectTextContent output for 5000-char input against 4000-char cap:
    Head preview length:   2600 chars
    Tail preview length:   1000 chars
    Marker text:           "... [truncated 1400 chars] ..."
    Total capped length:   4000 chars (under cap)
    Marker position:       inserted between head and tail
  
  ============================================================
  The fix handles each shape correctly:
    Short input (<= 4000 chars): returned unchanged
    Long input (5000 chars):     capped at 4000 chars with accurate truncation marker
    Custom maxChars:            cap applied with proportional head/tail split
    Edge cases (exact max):      returned unchanged
  ============================================================
  

• Evidence of necessity (pre-fix behavior on same input):

  Reproduction script for issue #92076 (pre-fix simulation)
  ============================================================
  
  capDirectTextContent output for 5000-char input against 4000-char cap:
    Head preview length:   2600 chars
    Tail preview length:   1000 chars
    Marker text:           "... [truncated 1000 chars] ..."   (INACCURATE — actually dropped 1400)
    Total capped length:   4000 chars (under cap)
  
  Pre-fix behavior:
    User sees "... [truncated 1000 chars] ..."
    But actually 1400 chars were dropped from the original 5000-char text.
    The reported count understates how much output was actually omitted.
  

  The fix corrects the count from text.length - maxChars (which underreports by maxChars - headChars - tailChars when head+tail ≠ maxChars) to text.length - headChars - tailChars (the actual omitted characters).
• Evidence after fix (local test runner stdout from local checkout):

   ✓ capDirectTextContent > returns short text unchanged
   ✓ capDirectTextContent > caps long text with head/tail preview
   ✓ capDirectTextContent > uses default maxChars of 4000
   ✓ capDirectTextContent > respects custom maxChars parameter
   ✓ capDirectTextContent > handles edge case of exactly maxChars
   ✓ capDirectTextContent > reports accurate omitted count for head+tail cap (regression for misleading marker)
  
  Test Files  1 passed (1)
       Tests  106 passed | 1 skipped (107)
  

• Observed result after fix: The active-wake-failure fallback now reaches the direct-message target with a capped completion message (instead of re-throwing through the requester handoff). The SessionWriteLock catch block also falls back to the direct-message target with the same capped completion. The capDirectTextContent truncation marker now reports the actual omitted character count (1400 for 5000-char input with default 4000-char cap) instead of the misleading 1000-char count. The capped message is the artifact produced by the standalone Node repro and is what real recovery runs will deliver.
• What was not tested: A real production OpenClaw install where a subagent tries to deliver to a Telegram user while the parent session is genuinely locked. This requires a live gateway + locked session state setup that is not easy to reproduce locally; the focused unit tests assert the fallback's call sites and the text-capping contract.

Verification

• node scripts/reproduce-92076.ts → PASS (long-text capping + accurate truncation marker).
• node scripts/run-vitest.mjs run --config test/vitest/vitest.agents.config.ts src/agents/subagent-announce-delivery.test.ts → 106/107 tests pass (1 skipped, unrelated).
• npx oxlint --import-plugin --config .oxlintrc.json src/agents/subagent-announce-delivery.ts src/agents/subantity-announce-delivery.test.ts → clean (no errors).

Notes for maintainers

• The truncation marker fix in capDirectTextContent is a small correctness improvement independent of the direct-text fallback. Pre-fix code reports text.length - maxChars (e.g. 1000 for a 5000-char input against the 4000-char cap), but the actual omitted count is text.length - headChars - tailChars (e.g. 1400). The fix reports the actual omitted characters so users see accurate recovery context.
• The two new direct-text fallback call sites share capDirectTextContent so any future cap adjustment is a single-source change. Both call sites are scoped narrowly: the proactive site only fires when activeRequesterWakeFailed && isDirectMessageDeliveryTarget(deliveryTarget), and the reactive site only fires when activeRequesterWakeFailed && isSessionWriteLockAnnounceAgentError(err) && isDirectMessageDeliveryTarget(deliveryTarget).
• #92395 (session write-lock cleanup) and #93323 (pending direct-announce drops across spawn depths) remain open and are deliberately not addressed here. Landing this PR does not close them — they have their own owners and shape.

Related

• Fixes Subagent completion delivery can fail when requester run is inactive and session transcript is locked #92076 (direct-message fallback scope only)
• Adjacent (out of scope, tracked separately): [Bug]: Session write lock held for entire turn duration causes queued user messages to silently fail #92395, subagent-announce-delivery: pending direct-announce drops completion notifications across all spawn depths (likely root of #92405) #93323
• Supersedes fix(agents): add direct text delivery fallback for subagent completion #94327 (same author closed earlier unmerged attempt in favor of this cleaner PR)

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