Problem

runEmbeddedPiAgent() and runEmbeddedAttempt() forward params.sessionKey directly to downstream consumers (hooks, compaction, LCM ingest). When callers omit sessionKey (which at least 2 confirmed call sites do), it propagates as undefined/null through:

• Hook contexts (beforeAgentStart, afterAgentEnd, beforeCompaction)
• LCM/lossless-claw afterTurn() → stored as session_key = NULL in the LCM database
• Compaction flows

Evidence from production

We found thousands of LCM database rows with session_key = NULL:

SELECT COUNT(*) FROM conversations WHERE session_key IS NULL;
-- Result: 847 conversations with null session_key

These null-key conversations break downstream features including:

• ignoreSessionPatterns glob matching silently no-ops (ignoreSessionPatterns has no effect: cron conversations have session_key = NULL, so glob matching silently no-ops Martian-Engineering/lossless-claw#176)
• Session-scoped compaction routing
• Any extension that uses sessionKey for session identification

Root cause

The correct resolver already exists in the codebase: resolveSessionKeyForRequest() from src/agents/command/session.ts. It's synchronous and store-backed — it resolves a sessionKey from sessionId when sessionKey is not provided.

The issue is that runEmbeddedPiAgent and runEmbeddedAttempt in src/agents/pi-embedded-runner/run.ts don't call it. They just pass through whatever params.sessionKey they receive.

Proposed fix

Add a backfill step at the top of the runner boundary (run.ts) that resolves sessionKey from sessionId when sessionKey is not explicitly provided:

import { resolveSessionKeyForRequest } from '../command/session.js';

function backfillSessionKey(params: { sessionId: string; sessionKey?: string }): string | undefined {
  if (params.sessionKey) return params.sessionKey;
  return resolveSessionKeyForRequest({ sessionId: params.sessionId });
}

Then use the resolved key for all downstream consumers. Explicit sessionKey takes precedence (no behavior change for callers that already provide it).

Related

• Downstream impact: ignoreSessionPatterns has no effect: cron conversations have session_key = NULL, so glob matching silently no-ops Martian-Engineering/lossless-claw#176 (ignoreSessionPatterns no-ops on null session_key)
• Partial fix: fix: pass sessionKey to buildEmbeddedExtensionFactories #49052 (threads sessionKey to extension factories, but doesn't resolve it when missing)
• We have a working source-level patch with regression test at 100yenadmin/eva-core — happy to upstream as a PR if wanted

Environment

• OpenClaw v2026.4.2
• Affects: src/agents/pi-embedded-runner/run.ts → runEmbeddedPiAgent(), runEmbeddedAttempt()