IceCube Heartbeat is a proactive maintenance system that enables AI agents to perform self-improvement, memory governance, and health checks during idle periods.
Install & Download
1. ClawHub CLI
The fastest way to install a skill directly from the registry.
npx clawhub@latest install icecube-heartbeat
2. Manual Installation
Copy the skill folder to one of these locations
~/.openclaw/skills/ <project>/skills/ Priority: Workspace > Local > Bundled
3. Prompt Installation
Copy this prompt to OpenClaw to install it automatically.
Help me install icecube-heartbeat using Clawhub. If Clawhub is not installed, install it first (npm i -g clawhub).
Prefer to download?
Get the raw skill files in a ZIP archive.
What is IceCube Heartbeat?
IceCube Heartbeat serves as the vital pulse for long-running AI assistants, ensuring they don't remain stagnant between user interactions. Instead of sitting idle, the agent utilizes heartbeat intervals to perform essential background tasks like system audits, memory consolidation, and proactive planning. This ensures that the agent becomes more efficient and smarter every day without requiring direct user intervention.
By leveraging this framework within the ecosystem of Openclaw Skills, developers can transform a reactive bot into a proactive partner. The skill focuses on maintaining high-quality memory logs, identifying recurring failure patterns, and staying updated with the latest capabilities and tools available to the agent.
IceCube Heartbeat Use Cases
- Automating the consolidation of short-term logs into long-term MEMORY.md files to prevent context bloat.
- Monitoring background task progress in unclosed_work.yaml to alert users of stagnated projects.
- Performing scheduled health checks on cron jobs and API configurations to ensure high uptime.
- Automatically discovering and installing relevant new Openclaw Skills from the ClawHub repository.
- Providing proactive notifications for calendar events or urgent emails during natural activity gaps.
How IceCube Heartbeat Works
- The OpenClaw host triggers a periodic heartbeat poll based on a pre-configured millisecond interval.
- The agent activates and reads HEARTBEAT.md to identify its current self-maintenance checklist.
- It performs a system health check by scanning task trackers and checking for failed session processes.
- Memory governance routines scan success and mistake logs to identify patterns worth promoting to the core memory.
- The agent checks for evolution triggers, such as new available tools or pending API activations.
- Based on findings and the current time of day, the agent either performs silent maintenance or reaches out to the user with a proactive status report.
IceCube Heartbeat Setup
To get started, create a HEARTBEAT.md file in your project root to define your agent's self-check tasks. Then, add the heartbeat configuration to your OpenClaw settings:
{
"agents": {
"heartbeat": {
"intervalMs": 1800000,
"prompt": "Read HEARTBEAT.md. Follow it strictly. Reply HEARTBEAT_OK if nothing needs attention."
}
}
}
You should also initialize the supporting logs used by this Openclaw Skills module:
touch mistake_log.md success_patterns.md heartbeat-state.json
IceCube Heartbeat Data Schema & Taxonomy
The skill organizes its maintenance data and state using a structured file hierarchy:
| File | Format | Description |
|---|---|---|
| HEARTBEAT.md | Markdown | The master checklist of maintenance and self-improvement tasks. |
| mistake_log.md | Markdown | A log of errors, impacts, and preventive measures to avoid recurrences. |
| success_patterns.md | Markdown | A repository of successful workflows and logic patterns for the agent. |
| heartbeat-state.json | JSON | Persistent state tracking for check timestamps and heartbeat frequency. |
| unclosed_work.yaml | YAML | A registry of pending tasks used to detect stagnation. |
IceCube Heartbeat Advanced Features
- Smart Silence Logic: Automatically suppresses non-urgent notifications during late-night hours or when the user is busy.
- Self-Improvement Detection: Flags repeated fallback or rollback patterns for root cause analysis.
- Cross-Skill Integration: Seamlessly triggers memory distillation routines and system operations via other IceCube-branded Openclaw Skills.
- Automated Evolution: Ability to autonomously assess and install new skills from ClawHub during weekly evolution cycles.
- Proactive Git Operations: Automatically commits and pushes documentation updates or project changes during idle cycles.
SKILL.md
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