🔄 Clawdbot Update Plus

A comprehensive backup, update, and restore tool for your entire Clawdbot environment. Protect your config, workspace, and skills with automatic rollback, encrypted backups, and cloud sync.

Quick Start

# Check for available updates
clawdbot-update-plus check

# Create a full backup
clawdbot-update-plus backup

# Update everything (creates backup first)
clawdbot-update-plus update

# Preview changes (no modifications)
clawdbot-update-plus update --dry-run

# Restore from backup
clawdbot-update-plus restore clawdbot-update-2026-01-25-12:00:00.tar.gz

Features

Feature

Description

Full Backup	Backup entire environment (config, workspace, skills)
Auto Backup	Creates backup before every update
Auto Rollback	Reverts to previous commit if update fails
Smart Restore	Restore everything or specific parts (config, workspace)
Multi-Directory	Separate prod/dev skills with independent update settings
Encrypted Backups	Optional GPG encryption
Cloud Sync	Upload backups to Google Drive, S3, Dropbox via rclone
Notifications	Get notified via WhatsApp, Telegram, or Discord
Modular Architecture	Clean, maintainable codebase

Installation

# Via ClawdHub
clawdhub install clawdbot-update-plus --dir ~/.clawdbot/skills

# Or clone manually
git clone  ~/.clawdbot/skills/clawdbot-update-plus

Add to PATH

Create a symlink to use the command globally:

mkdir -p ~/bin
echo 'export PATH="$HOME/bin:$PATH"' >> ~/.zshrc  # or ~/.bashrc
source ~/.zshrc
ln -sf ~/.clawdbot/skills/clawdbot-update-plus/bin/clawdbot-update-plus ~/bin/clawdbot-update-plus

Dependencies

Dependency

Required

Purpose

git	Yes	Update skills from repositories
jq	Yes	Parse JSON configuration
rsync	Yes	Efficient file copying
rclone	No	Cloud storage sync
gpg	No	Backup encryption

Configuration

Create ~/.clawdbot/clawdbot-update.json:

{
  "backup_dir": "~/.clawdbot/backups",
  "backup_before_update": true,
  "backup_count": 5,
  "backup_paths": [
    {"path": "~/.clawdbot", "label": "config", "exclude": ["backups", "logs", "media", "*.lock"]},
    {"path": "~/clawd", "label": "workspace", "exclude": ["node_modules", ".venv"]}
  ],
  "skills_dirs": [
    {"path": "~/.clawdbot/skills", "label": "prod", "update": true},
    {"path": "~/clawd/skills", "label": "dev", "update": false}
  ],
  "remote_storage": {
    "enabled": false,
    "rclone_remote": "gdrive:",
    "path": "clawdbot-backups"
  },
  "encryption": {
    "enabled": false,
    "gpg_recipient": "your-email@example.com"
  },
  "notifications": {
    "enabled": false,
    "target": "+1234567890",
    "on_success": true,
    "on_error": true
  }
}

Backup Paths

Configure what to backup with backup_paths:

Option

Description

path	Directory to backup (supports ~)
label	Name in logs and restore
exclude	Files/folders to exclude

Recommended Setup

"backup_paths": [
  {"path": "~/.clawdbot", "label": "config", "exclude": ["backups", "logs", "media"]},
  {"path": "~/clawd", "label": "workspace", "exclude": ["node_modules", ".venv"]}
]

Skills Update

Configure which skills to update with skills_dirs:

Option

Description

path	Skills directory
label	Name in logs
update	Run git pull (true/false)

Recommended Setup

"skills_dirs": [
  {"path": "~/.clawdbot/skills", "label": "prod", "update": true},
  {"path": "~/clawd/skills", "label": "dev", "update": false}
]

• Prod: Auto-update from ClawdHub/GitHub
• Dev: Manual only (protects your work)

Commands

backup — Create Full Backup

clawdbot-update-plus backup

list-backups — List Available Backups

clawdbot-update-plus list-backups

update — Update Everything

# Standard update (with automatic backup)
clawdbot-update-plus update

# Preview changes only
clawdbot-update-plus update --dry-run

# Skip backup
clawdbot-update-plus update --no-backup

# Force continue even if backup fails
clawdbot-update-plus update --force

restore — Restore from Backup

# Restore everything
clawdbot-update-plus restore backup.tar.gz

# Restore only config
clawdbot-update-plus restore backup.tar.gz config

# Restore only workspace
clawdbot-update-plus restore backup.tar.gz workspace

# Force (no confirmation)
clawdbot-update-plus restore backup.tar.gz --force

check — Check for Updates

clawdbot-update-plus check

install-cron — Automatic Updates

# Install daily at 2 AM
clawdbot-update-plus install-cron

# Custom schedule
clawdbot-update-plus install-cron "0 3 * * 0"  # Sundays at 3 AM

# Remove
clawdbot-update-plus uninstall-cron

Notifications

Get notified when updates complete or fail:

"notifications": {
  "enabled": true,
  "target": "+1234567890",
  "on_success": true,
  "on_error": true
}

Target format determines channel:

• +1234567890 → WhatsApp


• @username → Telegram


• channel:123 → Discord

Cloud Storage

Setup rclone

# Install
brew install rclone  # macOS
curl  | sudo bash  # Linux

# Configure
rclone config

Enable in Config

"remote_storage": {
  "enabled": true,
  "rclone_remote": "gdrive:",
  "path": "clawdbot-backups"
}

Encrypted Backups

"encryption": {
  "enabled": true,
  "gpg_recipient": "your-email@example.com"
}

Logs

All operations are logged to ~/.clawdbot/backups/update.log:

[2026-01-25 20:22:48] === Update started 2026-01-25 20:22:48 ===
[2026-01-25 20:23:39] Creating backup...
[2026-01-25 20:23:39] Backup created: clawdbot-update-2026-01-25-20:22:48.tar.gz (625M)
[2026-01-25 20:23:39] Clawdbot current version: 2026.1.22
[2026-01-25 20:23:41] Starting skills update
[2026-01-25 20:23:41] === Update completed 2026-01-25 20:23:41 ===
[2026-01-25 20:23:43] Notification sent to +1234567890 via whatsapp

Log retention: Logs older than 30 days are automatically deleted.

Retention Policy

Type

Retention

Config

Backups (local)	Last N backups	backup_count: 5
Backups (remote)	Last N backups	Same as local
Logs	30 days	Automatic

Architecture (v2.0)

bin/
├── clawdbot-update-plus     # Main entry point
└── lib/
    ├── utils.sh             # Logging, helpers
    ├── config.sh            # Configuration
    ├── backup.sh            # Backup functions
    ├── restore.sh           # Restore functions
    ├── update.sh            # Update functions
    ├── notify.sh            # Notifications
    └── cron.sh              # Cron management

Changelog

v2.0.0

• Complete architecture rewrite
• Modular design (7 separate modules)
• Cleaner codebase (~150 lines per module vs 1000+ monolith)
• Better error handling
• Improved restore with label support
• Auto-detect notification channel from target format
• Fixed --no-backup flag being ignored
• Detailed logging to file with auto-purge
• Backup retention policy (local + remote)

v1.7.0

• Smart restore with label support
• Auto-detect backup format

v1.6.0

• Added backup_paths for full environment backup
• Separated backup logic from update logic

v1.5.0

• Multi-directory support (skills_dirs)

v1.4.0

• Notifications via Clawdbot messaging

v1.3.0

• Added check, diff-backups, install-cron commands

Author

MIT