test(e2e): keep EXDEV forwards on canonical OpenShell

[sandl99]

Outcome

The custom-plugin EXDEV test can verify dashboard forward ownership during onboarding and recreation. Its image and tmpfs wrapper runs only for sandbox creation; forwarding uses the canonical OpenShell executable.

Reason

Main run 34587100109 failed onboarding after #11427 added forward ownership verification. The fixture selected a wrapper as its OpenShell executable, but the listener ran the real binary. Existing wrapper tests checked arguments without exercising that executable selection.

Related issues

Refs #6108. Regression from #11427.

Changes

• Select the canonical CLI in the shared fixture environment. The other consumer already receives its driver configuration from NemoClaw.
• Load a fixture-only Node preload for onboarding and recreation. It sends only the canonical CLI's sandbox create spawn through the existing image and tmpfs wrapper. A global executable override cannot preserve forward identity.
• Cover executable resolution, create argument rewriting, and direct forward/list execution in the support tests. Register the shared wrapper in the existing EXDEV mock-parity entry. Keep the EXDEV install, restart, recreation, image checks, and cleanup assertions.

Verification

• Focused E2E-support tests: 33 passed across the trusted prebuild, driver configuration, and workflow-boundary suites.
• Regression evidence: all three new routing cases failed when the previous wrapper executable selection was restored, then passed with the fix.
• npm run e2e:assertions:check: passed; existing live assertion budget unchanged.
• CLI and plugin builds passed. NODE_OPTIONS=--max-old-space-size=8192 npm run validate:pr passed on 855d5fce999acab6b21260902a580a4aa8826888, using canonical main 41c5625e8b831ed213cd5c381385973adc58659c. The larger heap is required by this host’s TypeScript check.
• The mock/live parity checker reproduced the missing ownership entry and passed after its one-line correction. The final correction changes only that mapping; fixture source and test results are unchanged.
• CI 34622479660: passed on 855d5fce999acab6b21260902a580a4aa8826888, including all 12 CLI shards, coverage, static checks, builds, and type checks.
• Focused live E2E 34622865200: passed. Onboarding, production installation across distinct filesystems, restart with the installed payload, recreation with plugin v2, and cleanup all passed. Onboarding and recreation passed on their first attempts. Downloaded artifact digests, dispatch identity, target results, and aggregate pass receipt were verified against the unchanged PR.
• E2E source: NVIDIA/NemoClaw (owner NVIDIA, organization); candidate 855d5fce999acab6b21260902a580a4aa8826888; base e6068115cc5e02e0d05abdb46ea4509138847617; trusted workflow 70cfff5f946a9bb31d1147f78ffbda914a2efaa2. Selector: jobs=openclaw-plugin-runtime-exdev, empty targets, mock inference. Correlation: e40a0daf-e1bb-4a56-bfe0-711faf7da239.
• Advisor 34623885835: blocked before review. All nine specialists failed with /sandbox/.profile: Permission denied followed by exec relay closed before the command reported an exit status; none produced review artifacts. The same startup failure occurs in the independent PR #11212 Advisor run. Keep this fixture fix unchanged; a maintainer decision is needed for the shared runtime blocker and subsequent full Advisor rerun.
• All paginated PR comments, reviews, and threads were collected. No code review findings were published. CodeRabbit skipped this draft; its success status does not represent a completed review.
• No secrets, API keys, or credentials were added.

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Signed-off-by: San Dang sdang@nvidia.com

Summary by CodeRabbit

• Tests
  • Expanded end-to-end coverage for OpenShell lifecycle workflows, including onboarding, recreation, gateway restart, and sandbox listing.
  • Improved validation that command routing remains consistent across supported workflows.
  • Added coverage for trusted prebuilt image handling and cross-device rename scenarios.
  • Updated test fixtures and environment checks to reflect the canonical command configuration.

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No actionable comments were generated in the recent review. 🎉

ℹ️ Recent review info

⚙️ Run configuration

Configuration used: Path: .coderabbit.yaml

Review profile: CHILL

Plan: Enterprise

Run ID: c49435c4-33d5-4f80-a240-20eec2ee2e67

📥 Commits

Reviewing files that changed from the base of the PR and between e606811 and 855d5fc.

📒 Files selected for processing (6)

• test/e2e/README.md
• test/e2e/live/openclaw-plugin-runtime-exdev-trusted-prebuild.ts
• test/e2e/live/openclaw-plugin-runtime-exdev.test.ts
• test/e2e/live/openshell-driver-config-test-wrapper.ts
• test/e2e/mock-parity.json
• test/e2e/support/openclaw-plugin-runtime-exdev-trusted-prebuild.test.ts

Included review availability: Your plan provides up to 12 included reviews per hour; 11 remain after this review.

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📝 Walkthrough

Walkthrough

The EXDEV test wrapper now intercepts only sandbox create commands. Onboarding and recreation preload this interceptor. Other OpenShell commands use the canonical CLI, with updated routing tests and documentation.

Changes

EXDEV command routing

Layer / File(s)	Summary
Create-only preload routing test/e2e/live/openclaw-plugin-runtime-exdev-trusted-prebuild.ts	The trusted image wrapper exposes a preload path and redirects only canonical sandbox create calls to the fixture executable.
Live command and environment integration test/e2e/live/openclaw-plugin-runtime-exdev.test.ts, test/e2e/live/openshell-driver-config-test-wrapper.ts, test/e2e/mock-parity.json	Onboarding and recreation preload the interceptor. Gateway restart and NEMOCLAW_OPENSHELL_BIN use the canonical CLI.
Command routing validation test/e2e/support/openclaw-plugin-runtime-exdev-trusted-prebuild.test.ts, test/e2e/README.md	Tests verify create, forward, and list routing. Documentation records the command-routing contract.

Priority: ⬇️ Low

Estimated code review effort: 3 (Moderate) | ~20 minutes

Change: Bug fix

Sequence Diagram(s)

sequenceDiagram
  participant OpenClawCLI
  participant NodePreloadInterceptor
  participant FixtureExecutable
  participant CanonicalOpenShellCLI
  OpenClawCLI->>NodePreloadInterceptor: run sandbox create
  NodePreloadInterceptor->>FixtureExecutable: redirect create command
  OpenClawCLI->>CanonicalOpenShellCLI: run forward or list

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Suggested reviewers: apurvvkumaria, jyaunches

Merge Risk: ⚪ Minimal · up to 855d5

The EXDEV test routing change preserves canonical OpenShell handling outside sandbox creation, with the changed flows covered by focused validation.

🚥 Pre-merge checks | ✅ 4 | ❌ 1

❌ Failed checks (1 warning)

Check name	Status	Explanation	Resolution
Docstring Coverage	⚠️ Warning	Docstring coverage is 0.00% which is insufficient. The required threshold is 80.00%. Docstring coverage is scoped to functions touched by this diff. Analyzed 2 functions across 4 files. (2 skipped: 2 …	Write docstrings for the functions missing them to satisfy the coverage threshold.

✅ Passed checks (4 passed)

Check name	Status	Explanation
Description Check	✅ Passed	Check skipped - CodeRabbit’s high-level summary is enabled.
Title check	✅ Passed	The title clearly and concisely describes the main change: keeping EXDEV forward operations on the canonical OpenShell executable.
Linked Issues check	✅ Passed	Check skipped because no linked issues were found for this pull request.
Out of Scope Changes check	✅ Passed	Check skipped because no linked issues were found for this pull request.

Full details: Docstring Coverage

Explanation

Docstring coverage is 0.00% which is insufficient. The required threshold is 80.00%. Docstring coverage is scoped to functions touched by this diff. Analyzed 2 functions across 4 files. (2 skipped: 2 unsupported.)

• Fix all pre-merge checks with AI

✨ Finishing Touches 💡 1

📝 Generate docstrings 💡

• Create stacked PR
• Commit on current branch

🧪 Generate unit tests (beta)

• Create PR with unit tests
• Commit unit tests in branch fix/e2e-exdev-forward-ownership

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[github-code-quality]

Code Coverage Overview

Languages: TypeScript

TypeScript / code-coverage/plugin

The overall line coverage in commit 855d5fc in the fix/e2e-exdev-forwar... branch remains at 96%, unchanged from commit 70cfff5 in the main branch.

Show a line coverage summary of the most impacted files.

File	main 70cfff5	fix/e2e-exdev-forwar... 855d5fc	+/-
nemoclaw/src/bl...ate-networks.ts	94%	89%	-5%

TypeScript / code-coverage/cli

The overall line coverage in commit 855d5fc in the fix/e2e-exdev-forwar... branch remains at 83%, unchanged from commit e606811 in the main branch.

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_{Updated September 11, 2026 16:45 UTC}

[sandl99]

Verification evidence for commit 855d5fce999acab6b21260902a580a4aa8826888:

• CI passed: run 34622479660, including all 12 CLI shards, coverage, static checks, builds, and type checks.
• Target E2E passed: OpenClaw EXDEV lifecycle job. Onboarding, production installation across distinct filesystems, restart with the installed payload, and recreation with plugin v2 all passed. Onboarding and recreation passed on their first attempts. All registered cleanup completed without failures.
• Local validation passed: 33 focused E2E-support tests, the unchanged live assertion budget check, and NODE_OPTIONS=--max-old-space-size=8192 npm run validate:pr. The three new routing cases failed with the previous executable selection and passed with the fix.

The change keeps the canonical OpenShell executable for forward ownership verification. Only sandbox creation uses the fixture's image and tmpfs wrapper. Production code is unchanged.

The E2E dispatch receipt identifies the tested commit above, base e6068115cc5e02e0d05abdb46ea4509138847617, and trusted workflow 70cfff5f946a9bb31d1147f78ffbda914a2efaa2. Selection: jobs=openclaw-plugin-runtime-exdev, empty targets, mock inference. Downloaded artifact digests, lifecycle results, cleanup results, and the aggregate pass receipt were verified.

Advisor review remains pending. Attempt 1 failed before producing any of the nine specialist reviews. Each job reported /sandbox/.profile: Permission denied, followed by an OpenShell exec relay error. The same startup failure occurred in an independent PR's Advisor job. A subsequent Advisor attempt is now running; a clean review is not yet verified.

[cjagwani]

Approved: the create-only preload keeps image/tmpfs rewriting on sandbox creation while forward and list operations retain canonical OpenShell identity. Focused E2E-support validation passed 27/27, and the exact trusted EXDEV lifecycle passed onboarding, restart, recreation, canonical listener ownership, and cleanup. Required checks and commit verification are green.\n\n