Quickstart

Install netclaw, run the setup wizard, talk to your agent. Takes about 5 minutes.

1. Install

curl -sSL https://releases.netclaw.dev/install.sh | bash

See Installation for Windows, Docker, and build-from-source options.

2. Run the setup wizard

netclaw init

The wizard walks you through everything. Here’s what to expect.

Pick a provider

Choose an LLM provider and enter credentials. Self-hosted providers like Ollama need an endpoint URL. Once credentials pass a connectivity check, you pick a default model:

Use netclaw provider to add more providers later.

Set your security posture

Pick how much you trust the environment. Personal is single-user with full tool access. Team and Public are progressively more restrictive. See Security Model for details.

Connect channels (optional)

Wire up Slack, Discord, or both. Each channel needs a token — the wizard prompts for them and tests connectivity before moving on.

Tokens are masked and stored encrypted. See the Slack or Discord pages for full setup guides including app creation.

Set your identity

Tell netclaw who you are. This sets the owner identity for the agent.

Pick a personality style — this shapes how the agent talks to you.

Choose network exposure

Local (default) means the daemon only listens on loopback. Tailscale and Cloudflare Tunnel options make it reachable from other machines. See Exposure Modes and Pairing Remote Devices.

Health check

The wizard validates your config — provider connectivity, channel tokens, network setup. All green means the daemon starts automatically.

3. Start chatting

netclaw chat

The agent introduces itself and kicks off a personality bootstrapping conversation — it asks about your work, your tools, and what you need help with. This builds your profile so future conversations have context.

See Your First Conversation for the full walkthrough of what happens next.

Headless mode

Don’t need the TUI? Send a one-shot prompt from your terminal:

netclaw chat -p "what's the weather in Chicago?"

Pipe output to other tools with --json. See netclaw chat for the full reference.

What’s next

• Your First Conversation — personality bootstrapping and your first real interaction
• netclaw doctor — diagnose issues if something didn’t work
• netclaw status — check daemon health and connector states
• Slack / Discord — full channel setup guides