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Run NanoClaw in Docker Sandboxes

nanoclaw.dev

11–20 of 64 posts

Re: Run NanoClaw in Docker Sandboxes

#11
They may seem like small details, but I think a couple novel design decisions are going to prove to be widely adopted and revolutionary.

The biggest one (as Karpathy notes) is having skills for how to write a (slack, discord, etc) integration, instead of shipping an implementation for each.

Call it “Claude native development” if you will, but “fork and customize” instead of batteries-included platforms/frameworks is going to be a big shift when it percolates through the ecosystem.

A bunch of things you need to figure out, eg how do you ship a spec for how to test and validate the thing, make it secure, etc.

How long before OSs start evolving in this way? You can imagine Auto research-like sharing and promotion upstream of good fixes/approaches, but a more heterogenous ecosystem could be more resistant to attacks if each instance had a strong immune system.

Re: Run NanoClaw in Docker Sandboxes

#13
post #4

I like NanoClaw a lot. I found OpenClaw to be a bloated mess, NanoClaw implementation is so much tighter. It's also the first project I've used where Claude Code is the setup and configuration interface. It works really well, and it's fun to add new features on a whim.

what workflows do you implement in Nanoclaw that wouldn't be straightforward to build in Claude?

Straightforward is ambiguous. To replicate NanoClaw would probably only take about a day of work and testing and refining in Claude Code, but that's a day I didn't have to spend to get NanoClaw.

Re: Run NanoClaw in Docker Sandboxes

#14
As an aside, app descriptions that just say "a lightweight alternative to X" are very unhelpful. That tells me nothing if I don't know what X does, and I don't want to have to go down a rabbit hole just to understand your product. It's particularly bad in this case, because even OpenClaw's Github page doesn't clearly tell me what it actually does; just that it's some kind of assistant that I can communicate with via WhatsApp etc. I appreciate that many people are already familiar with OpenClaw, but you shouldn't assume.

It's better if your app's description just tells me what it does in a direct way using plain language. It's fine to tell me it's an alternative to something, but that should be in addition to rather than instead of your own description.

Re: Run NanoClaw in Docker Sandboxes

#15
Docker sandboxes sound exactly like what Apple is doing with their `container` framework. It's missing several Docker features still, but if I were to pick a minimal, native runtime, it would probably be that, not the multi-gigabyte monster that is Docker for macOS.

On Linux, however, I absolutely don't want a hypervisor on my quite underpowered single-board server. Linux namespaces are enough for what I want from them (i.e. preventing one of these agent harnesses to hijack my memory, disk, or CPU). I wonder why neither OpenClaw nor NanoClaw seem to offer a sanely configured, prebuilt, and frequently updated Docker image?

Re: Run NanoClaw in Docker Sandboxes

#17

What are the most obvious use cases for Nano/Open-Claw. I can't imagine anything obvious that I'd want to use it for. Is it supposed to run your digital life for you?

Hooking it up to your todo app and texting your bot to manage things. Assuming you’re a heavy todo app person that could benefit from such things.

Re: Run NanoClaw in Docker Sandboxes

#18
What I found interesting is nanoclaw isn’t a working product out of the box. You must use a coding agent to complete it with features you want. For example add iMessage support, etc.

In other words, Claude is the compiler.

Re: Run NanoClaw in Docker Sandboxes

#19

What are the most obvious use cases for Nano/Open-Claw. I can't imagine anything obvious that I'd want to use it for. Is it supposed to run your digital life for you?

The non-answer is anything you want.

For me, it's my diet and workout buddy. It knows my goals, keeps me on track, does meal planning for me, gives me grocery lists, logs what I eat, when I exercise... anything I want so I don't slack off.

I've enhanced Nanoclaw quite a bit. Moved it to Apple containers (shipped with this Skill already). Then I wrote an API for Nanoclaw to use (food log, workouts, etc), then implemented long-term memory using LanceDB (because I was tired of repeating myself!).

Re: Run NanoClaw in Docker Sandboxes

#20
post #11

They may seem like small details, but I think a couple novel design decisions are going to prove to be widely adopted and revolutionary. The biggest one (as Karpathy notes) is having skills for how to write a (slack, discord, etc) integration, instead of shipping an implementation for each. Call it “Claude native development” if you will, but “fork and customize” instead of batteries-included platforms/frameworks is…

I get the appeal but I disagree

The strength of open source software is collaboration. That many people have tried it, read it, submitted fixes and had those fixes reviewed and accepted.

We've all seen LLMs spit out garbage bugs on the first few tries. I've written garbage bugs on my first try too. We all benefit from the review process.

I would rather have a battle tested base to start customizing from than having to stumble through the pitfalls of a buggy or insecure AI implementation.

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