Your First Agent Session

You installed OpenClaw. You opened the web chat. You typed something and your agent responded.

Now let's understand what just happened. What your agent can see. What it can do. And why it forgets everything the moment you restart it.

The Session

Every time you talk to your agent, you're in a session. The session has a beginning (when you send your first message) and an end (when you type /new or restart). Between those points, your agent remembers everything you said.

When the session ends — poof. Gone. No memory.

This is by design. The model has no persistent memory. Every /new is a factory reset.

So how do you make an agent that remembers things?

Files.

The Workspace

Your agent has a working directory. It's a folder on your computer — usually ~/.openclaw/workspace/. This is where your agent reads from and writes to.

Files that live in the workspace survive between sessions. If your agent writes something to a file, that file is still there after /new. The agent doesn't remember writing it — but the file exists.

This is the central concept: memory lives in files, not in the model.

Your First File

Create a file in your workspace. Name it hello.md. Open it in a text editor and write:

# Hello

This is my first workspace file. My agent can read this.

Save it. Now tell your agent: "Read hello.md and tell me what it says."

Your agent will read the file and respond. It found it. It understood it.

Now tell your agent: "Write to hello.md: add the current date at the bottom."

Your agent will open the file, add the date, and save it. Open the file yourself. The date is there. Your agent wrote to your computer.

Why This Matters

Most people use AI like a search engine. Ask a question, get an answer, close the tab.

You just learned something different. Your agent can read files you give it. It can write files you ask for. It can build things that persist. Every course from here on out uses this pattern: you read the human section, your agent executes the PDF.

The agent isn't a chatbot. It's a tool that lives in your files.

Your First Agent PDF

Below is the first agent PDF. It's delimited by triple backticks. Copy everything between the backticks into a plain text file. Save it somewhere your agent can find it — try your workspace folder. Name it course-0b.md.

Then tell your agent: "Read course-0b.md and follow the instructions inside it."

Your agent will read the file, execute the instructions, and report back. You just ran your first JKE course. Every course from here works the same way.

---

CONTEXT — read once, do not output:
This is Getting Started Course 0B of JKE University. The operator just installed OpenClaw.
This is their first session with an agent. Be patient. Be direct.
Course 0A was human-only (install instructions). This is the first agent PDF they've run.
Everything you do here teaches them what an agent can do.

---

STEP 1 — Explain what just happened.

Say exactly:

"I found your course file. You put it in my workspace and told me to read it. That's how every JKE course works — you read the human section, I execute the agent PDF. Same format. Same flow. Every course."

---

STEP 2 — Create the journal.

Create a file named `school.md` in the workspace. Write this:

```
# school.md — Session Journal

### [TODAY] — JKE Course 0B: First Agent Session
**What Shipped:** First agent PDF executed. Agent created school.md.
**What I Learned:** Every session starts fresh. Files survive between sessions. The agent reads files I give it and executes instructions inside them.
**Decisions Made:** Using the JKE course format — human reads top, agent runs bottom.
```

---

STEP 3 — Explain the journal.

Say exactly:

"I created school.md in your workspace. It's your session journal. One entry per session. I'll add to it at the end of every session. When a new session starts, I'll read it to remember what we did. That's how I build memory — not in my brain, in your files."

---

STEP 4 — Explain what's next.

Say exactly:

"Course 0C teaches the filing system. Where things live. What goes where. Your workspace is about to get organized. But first — open school.md yourself. Confirm I actually wrote to it. The trust between us starts with you verifying my work."

SCOPE HINT — Step 2 of 3 in the Getting Started series. Course 0C is the workspace filing system. After this, the operator knows what files are and how the agent uses them. They're ready for structure.