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Claws are now a new layer on top of LLM agents

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Re: Claws are now a new layer on top of LLM agents

#851

Post by root_axis »

throwaway13337 wrote: post #529
daxfohl wrote: post #460

I wonder how the internet would have been different if claws had existed beforehand. I keep thinking something simpler like Gopher (an early 90's web protocol) might have been sufficient / optimal, with little need to evolve into HTML or REST since the agents might be better able to navigate step-by-step menus and questionnaires, rather than RPCs meant to support GUIs and apps, especially for LLMs with smaller contex…

This is the future we need to make happen. I would love to subscribe to / pay for service that are just APIs. Then have my agent organize them how I want. Imagine youtube, gmail, hacker news, chase bank, whatsapp, the electric company all being just apis. You can interact how you want. The agent can display the content the way you choose. Incumbent companies will fight tooth and nail to avoid this future. Because it'…

> Because it's a future without monopoly power.

Except for the LLM driving the entire process.

Re: Claws are now a new layer on top of LLM agents

#852

Post by corndoge »

Gareth321 wrote: post #822
corndoge wrote: post #746

I still don't understand what openclaw is or does and i've read the docs multiple times over. "Any OS gateway for AI agents across WhatsApp, Telegram, Discord, iMessage, and more. Send a message, get an agent response from your pocket. Plugins add Mattermost and more." "What is OpenClaw? OpenClaw is a self-hosted gateway that connects your favorite chat apps — WhatsApp, Telegram, Discord, iMessage, and more — to AI c…

It was surprisingly difficult for me to understand the use case as well. Here is my best attempt at an elevator pitch: At present your memories are proprietary data in whichever LLM you use. ChatGPT keeps all your conversations and output and data forever. What if you don't like GPT 5.2? What if you want to use other models as well? Or use the best model for the job? OpenClaw gives you that ability. Your memories and…

> At present your memories are proprietary data in whichever LLM you use.

I store my "memories" in markdown on disk, accessible with RAG independent of which model i use or where inference runs. This is pretty common I think?

> What if you don't like GPT 5.2? What if you want to use other models as well? Or use the best model for the job? OpenClaw gives you that ability

I use primarily local models so I don't have this problem to begin with, but to my understanding openrouter provides that for people using cloud models. What does openclaw do specifically in this area?

> OpenClaw allows you to integrate with whichever services you like. Google, Microsoft, etc. ChatGPT locks you into whichever integrations they offer. You can give OpenClaw full systems access. It can monitor files, emails, network, etc.

Any frontend that supports tool calls can do this, what is unique to openclaw?

> Third, OpenClaw allows you to run your models as agents. Meaning perpetual and iterative. They can much better handle recurring tasks, monitor things, etc.

What does this actually mean? is there a cron job that runs an agent on a schedule or something?

I'm asking not to disagree but because i still do not understand what is novel in openclaw.

Re: Claws are now a new layer on top of LLM agents

#853

Post by the__alchemist »

corndoge wrote: post #746

I still don't understand what openclaw is or does and i've read the docs multiple times over. "Any OS gateway for AI agents across WhatsApp, Telegram, Discord, iMessage, and more. Send a message, get an agent response from your pocket. Plugins add Mattermost and more." "What is OpenClaw? OpenClaw is a self-hosted gateway that connects your favorite chat apps — WhatsApp, Telegram, Discord, iMessage, and more — to AI c…

It is a neighboring variety of bullshit terminology to that associated with NFTs, and some varieties of cryptocurrencies. (Ethereum gas and staking, etc) The terminology is intended to confuse rather than clarify.

Re: Claws are now a new layer on top of LLM agents

#855

Post by nsonha »

simonw wrote: post #844
nsonha wrote: post #290

I find it dubious that a technical person claims to "just bought a new Mac mini to properly tinker with claws over the weekend". Like can they not just play with it on an old laptop lying around? A virtual machine? Or why did they not buy a Pi instead? Openclaw works with linux so not sure how this whole Mac mini cliche even started, obviously an overkill for something that only relays api calls.

Why would Andrej lie about this? Why would the other people who claim to do this lie?

I don't know, just so it seems like they gave it a proper look when they did not? Btw a vps is another choice even more obvious.

Re: Claws are now a new layer on top of LLM agents

#857

Post by DaedalusII »

corndoge wrote: post #852
Gareth321 wrote: post #822

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was surprisingly difficult for me to understand the use case as well. Here is my best attempt at an elevator pitch: At present your memories are proprietary data in whichever LLM you use. ChatGPT keeps all your conversations and output and data forever. What if you don't like GPT 5.2? What if you want to use other models as well? Or use the best model for the job? OpenClaw gives you that ability. Your memories and…

> At present your memories are proprietary data in whichever LLM you use. I store my "memories" in markdown on disk, accessible with RAG independent of which model i use or where inference runs. This is pretty common I think? > What if you don't like GPT 5.2? What if you want to use other models as well? Or use the best model for the job? OpenClaw gives you that ability I use primarily local models so I don't have th…

i dont use clawbot or whatever its called today myself

it is basically the productisation of what you have described, which allows for social diffusion. buy mac mini, choco install {symbolic abstraction of corndoge entire local gpt/storage stack that I dont understand the mechanics or consequences of}

Re: Claws are now a new layer on top of LLM agents

#858

Post by selridge »

tovej wrote: post #807
selridge wrote: post #738

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love that the posture is I have a problem I need you to fix haha. I don't need you to fix my problems. I'm reporting that the LLM-based solution beats the dogshit out of the old "become a journeyman on one of 11 billion bullshit formats or processes" practice.

I'm not trying to help you, I'm just wondering how the LLM actually helps you. You don't need to become a journeyman at understanding a format, you just need to see a schema, or find an open source utility. I just can't comprehend the actual helplessness that a developer would have to experience in order to have to ask an LLM to do something like this. If I were that daunted by parsing a standardized file format for…

I’ll give you a real concrete example. I had to build an app on the Mac, which needed to be signed. I did not want to learn Apple signing procedures in order to do this. It turns out I did not have to, because I got the robot to learn it. So then I was able to finish doing what it was I intended to do without having to spend an afternoon or a day misunderstanding the Apple signing procedures.

Could I have learned these and become a more virtuous person by knowing apples signing rules? Maybe. What’s much more likely is that I might’ve just stopped doing this rather than deal with that particular difficulty. Instead, I was able to work on other problems that arose in the building of this application.

What I am suggesting to you is that I don’t have to fucking feel bad for being daunted anymore. And neither does anyone else. Folks that want to do that on their own time are free to, but I’m never going back.

There’s a lot of projects for people where this is gonna start to be the operative situation. Folks who might have gotten stuck on an early stumbling block are now just moving ahead and are learning about different and frankly more interesting problems to solve. I’m still beating my head on things, but they are not. “did I get this format just right?”

This shift is an analogous to how we took having to do computer arithmetic out of the hands of programmers in the 80s. There used to be a substantial part of programming that was just a computer arithmetic. Now, almost nobody does that. Nobody in this thread could build a full adder if their life depended on it or produce an accurate sin function. It used to be that that would’ve stopped you cold and trying to answer an engineering problem on a computer. Now it doesn’t. We do not run around telling people that they’re not engineers or that they’re not learning because we have made this affordance.

Re: Claws are now a new layer on top of LLM agents

#859

Post by throwaway13337 »

tines wrote: post #826
throwaway13337 wrote: post #750

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's right. And don't forget that the chips it runs on are manufactured by companies I might not agree with. Nor the mining companies that got the metal. Nor the energy company that powers it. The wonderful thing about markets that work is that you can swap things out without being under their boot. I worry about a LLM duopology. But as long as open weight models are nipping at their heels, it is the consumer that…

> And don't forget that the chips it runs on are manufactured by companies I might not agree with. Nor the mining companies that got the metal. Nor the energy company that powers it. You see that this is a non sequitur right? No matter who makes the chips or mines the metal or supplies the power, the behavior of the thing won't be affected. That isn't the case when we're talking about who's training the LLM that's ru…

It's a good thing that there are so many LLM choices out there, then.

Maybe the fundamental disagreement is whether LLMs will be a commodity product or not.

I think they will be since there hasn't been an indicator that secret sauce lasts more than a few months. The open weight models are, at most, a year behind.

We're in a different environment. The last tech rules of e.g. network effect cannot be directly applied.

Re: Claws are now a new layer on top of LLM agents

#860

Post by simonw »

nsonha wrote: post #855
simonw wrote: post #844

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would Andrej lie about this? Why would the other people who claim to do this lie?

I don't know, just so it seems like they gave it a proper look when they did not? Btw a vps is another choice even more obvious.

As others have pointed out the problem with a VPS is that it doesn't run macOS, which means it can't integrate with a bunch of popular OpenClaw tools like AppleScript and iMessage.

You can rent Mac machines in the cloud but they're expensive. Buying a Mac mini isn't a bad option.

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