OpenClaw Updates: Enhancing macOS Experience, CLI Stability, and CI Reliability

This digest covers a series of important pull requests merged into the openclaw/openclaw repository within a recent six-hour window. These updates primarily focus on bolstering the stability and user experience of the macOS Companion App, refining the command-line interface, and strengthening internal CI workflows. The changes reflect a commitment to addressing critical user pain points and ensuring the robustness of the OpenClaw platform.\n\n## Merged PRs\n\n* PR #75039 · fix(macos): keep A2UI canvas content visible\n* PR #75038 · fix(macos): repair stale gateway tls pins\n* PR #75002 · fix(ci): manual stale-closure backfill medium-risk bugs\n* PR #75003 · fix(cli): avoid progress spinners in active TUI input\n\n## Key Changes\n\nThe recent merges highlight several key areas of development, from critical macOS application fixes to internal process improvements.\n\n### macOS Companion App Stability and Connectivity\n\nA significant focus has been on enhancing the macOS Companion App's reliability.\n\nA2UI Canvas Content Visibility\nA critical bug (addressed in PR #75039) previously caused the macOS Canvas A2UI to render a completely blank screen after a successful canvas a2ui push operation. This issue, documented in #73337, meant that despite the gateway reporting success, the user would see an empty A2UI shell, effectively making the feature unusable on macOS. The root cause was identified as a redundant auto-navigation reload of the WebView, which wiped in-memory surfaces. The fix makes A2UI auto-navigation idempotent, preventing unnecessary reloads when the Canvas is already at the target A2UI host URL, thus ensuring pushed content remains visible.\n\n> "On macOS Companion App Canvas, pushing A2UI content via canvas a2ui_push returns { ok: true } from the gateway, but the Canvas (A2UI) window stays completely blank — no rendered content, no 'Waiting for A2UI message' placeholder, just the empty gradient background." — Issue #73337\n\nGateway TLS Pin Repair\nConnectivity for the macOS Companion App also received an important fix (PR #75038) related to stale TLS pins. Previously, mismatches in TLS pins for gateway connections could manifest as generic WebSocket cancellations, making diagnosis difficult. This update introduces structured error detection for TLS pin mismatches and, crucially, an auto-repair mechanism for trusted stale TLS pins. This is particularly beneficial for environments with rotating certificates, such as Tailscale Serve, ensuring that the companion app can automatically adapt and reconnect. The change also improves the surfacing of partial macOS companion connectivity, providing clearer status indicators for users.\n\n### CLI User Experience Refinements\n\nThe command-line interface saw an improvement aimed at enhancing interactive sessions.\n\nPreventing Progress Spinner Interference in TUI\nPR #75003 addresses a user experience issue where CLI progress spinners could disrupt active Text User Interface (TUI) input, particularly within Crestodian. When stdin was already in raw mode (as is the case during TUI interaction), nested CLI progress spinners would take over, interrupting the user's input loop. The fix ensures that CLI progress skips readline-backed spinners when stdin is raw, preserving the TUI's input integrity while still allowing normal interactive spinners for regular terminal commands.\n\n### Internal CI Workflow Reliability\n\nUnderpinning the development process, a critical fix was applied to the continuous integration (CI) system.\n\nStale-Closure Backfill Bug Fixes\nPR #75002 resolved two medium-risk bugs in the manual stale-closure backfill CI workflow. The first bug caused the backfill to ignore the close grace window for assigned pull requests, potentially closing PRs that had recent activity but still carried the stale label. The second bug involved the max_closures parameter, where setting it to 0 unexpectedly resulted in closing all eligible candidates instead of zero. These fixes ensure the repository's automated maintenance processes operate as intended, preventing unintended closures and providing maintainers with precise control over stale item management.\n\n## Impact\n\nThese merged pull requests collectively contribute to a more stable, reliable, and user-friendly OpenClaw experience across several fronts.\n\nFor macOS Companion App users, the impact is immediate and significant. The fix for the A2UI canvas ensures that a core feature now works as expected, allowing users to reliably push and view content without frustrating blank screens. Improved TLS pin handling means more robust and less error-prone gateway connectivity, especially in dynamic network environments, reducing connection issues and improving diagnostic clarity.\n\nCLI users, particularly those interacting with Crestodian's TUI, will benefit from a smoother, uninterrupted workflow. The prevention of progress spinner interference enhances the responsiveness and predictability of the command-line interface, making it a more pleasant tool to use.\n\nFinally, the OpenClaw maintainer community gains increased confidence in the automated repository management tools. The fixes to the stale-closure backfill workflow prevent accidental closures of active PRs and provide accurate control over bulk operations, ensuring that repository hygiene is maintained without unintended side effects. These internal improvements are crucial for sustaining an efficient and reliable development ecosystem.