Context Cleaner Skill#

Automatically manage session context size by compressing large contexts and cleaning up expired sessions, sub-agents, and temporary files.

Quick Reference#

SituationActionSession exceeds size limitCompress early messagesSub-agent idle > 30minTerminate automaticallyOld sessions (> 7 days)Archive or deleteLarge context (> 10K tokens)Summarize and compress

Setup#

No special setup required. The skill automatically:

1. Monitors session sizes - Checks if current session context is growing too large
2. Terminates idle sub-agents - Stops sub-agents that haven't been used recently
3. Archives old sessions - Moves completed sessions to archive
4. Compresses context - Replaces verbose message chains with summaries

Usage#

Automatic Operation#

The skill runs automatically during heartbeat checks when context size exceeds thresholds.

Manual Trigger#

Request cleanup anytime:

text

"Clean up context now"
"Remove expired sessions"
"Compress my context"

API Call#

Use sessions_list and subagents tools internally. The skill orchestrates:

1. List all sessions
2. Check sub-agent status
3. Terminate idle sub-agents
4. Compress large contexts
5. Archive old sessions

Operation Logic#

Context Compression#

When a session's context exceeds thresholds:

1. Identify compressible regions - Early messages, completed task steps
2. Generate summaries - Create concise summaries of message chains
3. Replace verbose content - Keep only essential information
4. Preserve key context - Maintain user preferences, decisions, ongoing tasks

Session Cleanup#

Expired session criteria:

• Idle time: No activity for 7+ days
• Completed tasks: Sessions that finished long ago
• Orphaned sessions: No associated work

Sub-Agent Management#

Termination criteria:

• Idle: No messages sent/received for 30+ minutes
• Failed tasks: Sub-agents that encountered repeated errors
• Manual request: User explicitly requests cleanup

Best Practices#

1. Preserve working sessions - Never clean active sessions
2. Keep recent history - Maintain last 24-48 hours of messages
3. Archive not delete - Move to archive before deleting
4. Respect user context - Don't clean sessions with pending tasks
5. Notify before major cleanup - Warn before deleting important sessions

Integration Points#

Heartbeat Integration#

Add to HEARTBEAT.md:

markdown

## 上下文管理
- [ ] 检查会话大小
- [ ] 清理过期子代理
- [ ] 压缩过大上下文

Cron Integration#

Schedule regular cleanup:

bash

# Weekly full cleanup
cron add -name "weekly-context-clean" -schedule "0 3 * * 0" -payload "Compress contexts and clean expired sessions"

Compression Strategies#

Message Chaining#

Convert:

text

User: Ask question
Model: Answer with detailed explanation
User: Follow-up
Model: More details

To:

text

User: Ask question
Model: ✅ Answered with 4-point explanation
User: Follow-up
Model: Continued discussion

Context Summarization#

Summarize long conversation threads:

• Key decisions: User preferences, important conclusions
• Task progress: Completed items, pending actions
• Context notes: Relevant background information

Session Archiving#

Archive strategy:

1. Check completion status - Is session finished?
2. Verify no active work - No pending tasks
3. Check age - Created more than 7 days ago?
4. Move to archive - Session archive directory
5. Update metadata - Record completion details

File Structure#

text

workspace/
├── .archive/          # Archived sessions
│   ├── 2026-04/
│   │   ├── session-uuid-1/
│   │   └── session-uuid-2/
│   └── 2026-05/
├── .cache/            # Temporary compression data
└── .cleanup/          # Cleanup logs and reports
    └── cleanup-report.md

Safety Checks#

Before any cleanup operation:

1. Verify session status - Not actively being used
2. Check pending tasks - No incomplete operations
3. User preferences - Respect "keep forever" flags
4. Recent activity - Last message within threshold
5. Archive option - Offer archive before delete

Example Outputs#

Cleanup Report#

markdown

## Context Cleanup Report

**Time**: 2026-04-17 10:43
**Operations**:
- ✅ Compressed 3 large contexts (saved 15K tokens)
- ✅ Terminated 2 idle sub-agents
- ✅ Archived 1 old session (30 days)
- ⚠️ Skipped 1 active session (pending task)

**Impact**:
- Context size: Reduced by 25%
- Free tokens: ~50K available
- Active sessions: 5 (unchanged)

Related Skills#

• self-improvement: Log learnings about context management
• taskflow: Manage multi-step cleanup tasks
• memory: Keep important context in long-term memory

---

Note: This skill works alongside existing OpenClaw tools without requiring special permissions.