[Bug]: cron-owned exec completion events are incorrectly relayed to the user by heartbeat

Bug type

Behavior bug (incorrect output/state without crash)

Beta release blocker

No

Summary

After an isolated cron run already completes with its own final result, OpenClaw still relays the cron-internal exec completion event to the user through heartbeat as a separate user-facing async-result message.

Steps to reproduce

1. Start from a clean Linux runtime. In this reproduction, ~/.openclaw was archived and rebuilt with only:
   • openclaw.json
   • .env
   • cron/jobs.json
   • hooks/
   • extensions/
2. Run:

   openclaw cron run --expect-final 392e2cfd-abd2-40a2-8aa2-fc05937e372b

3. Observe the actual cron run transcript:
   • ~/.openclaw/agents/main/sessions/db42c881-a887-4cc6-a5bf-10b426cbfa58.jsonl
4. Confirm the cron run itself finishes with:

   news_fetcher ok
   

5. Observe the later heartbeat relay transcript:
   • ~/.openclaw/agents/main/sessions/e70f3c08-0015-4ba8-96ee-52f83e2f04a3.jsonl
6. Confirm heartbeat receives a user message whose body starts with:

   An async command you ran earlier has completed. The result is:
   
   Exec completed (rapid-br, code 0) :: news snapshot written to temp/news/raw-latest.md
   

7. Run:

   openclaw system heartbeat last --json

8. Observe that Telegram receives a second user-facing completion report for the same internal cron execution.

Expected behavior

Once the cron run has already produced its own final result (news_fetcher ok), the internal exec completion should remain internal and should not later be relayed to the user by heartbeat as a separate async-result message.

Actual behavior

The cron run finishes correctly with news_fetcher ok, but OpenClaw still emits an internal exec completion event and later relays that event to the user through heartbeat.

In this clean-runtime reproduction, the final user-facing relay was:

[完成] 异步命令已完成

- 结果：成功，退出码 0
- 输出：`news snapshot written to temp/news/raw-latest.md`

如果你要，我也可以继续帮你查看这个快照内容。

This shows the bug still exists even after removing stale runtime state; only the language of the relay changed.

OpenClaw version

2026.4.11 (769908e)

Operating system

Ubuntu 24.04 (Linux x86_64)

Install method

npm global

Model

Observed cron path:

• initial provider/model attempt: minimax/MiniMax-M2.7-highspeed
• final successful cron result provider/model: openai/gpt-5.4-mini
• later heartbeat relay model: openai/gpt-5.4-mini

Provider / routing chain

openclaw -> configured agent default model chain -> minimax first, then OpenAI fallback

Additional provider/model setup details

• Agent default model chain in ~/.openclaw/openclaw.json:
  • primary: minimax/MiniMax-M2.7-highspeed
  • fallbacks include:
    • openai-codex/gpt-5.4-mini
    • openai/gpt-5.4-mini
    • openai-codex/gpt-5.4
    • openai/gpt-5.4
    • anthropic/claude-opus-4-6
    • google/gemini-3.1-flash-lite-preview
• The reproduction was re-run after rebuilding ~/.openclaw from a minimal clean Linux runtime, so this report is not based on migrated stale session state.

Logs, screenshots, and evidence

Affected job:
- Name: 新闻原始抓取
- Job ID: 392e2cfd-abd2-40a2-8aa2-fc05937e372b

Cron run transcript:
- ~/.openclaw/agents/main/sessions/db42c881-a887-4cc6-a5bf-10b426cbfa58.jsonl

Observed final cron answer:
- news_fetcher ok

Run history:
- ~/.openclaw/cron/runs/392e2cfd-abd2-40a2-8aa2-fc05937e372b.jsonl

Observed run entry:
- summary: news_fetcher ok
- status: ok
- delivered: false

Heartbeat relay transcript:
- ~/.openclaw/agents/main/sessions/e70f3c08-0015-4ba8-96ee-52f83e2f04a3.jsonl

Observed heartbeat input:
An async command you ran earlier has completed. The result is:

Exec completed (rapid-br, code 0) :: news snapshot written to temp/news/raw-latest.md

Please relay the command output to the user in a helpful way. If the command succeeded, share the relevant output. If it failed, explain what went wrong.

Observed heartbeat output:
[完成] 异步命令已完成

- 结果：成功，退出码 0
- 输出：`news snapshot written to temp/news/raw-latest.md`

如果你要，我也可以继续帮你查看这个快照内容。

Observed heartbeat delivery preview from:
- openclaw system heartbeat last --json

Root-cause evidence from installed dist:

File: dist/bash-tools.exec-runtime-jfecOhNR.js

Current behavior:
- maybeNotifyOnExit(...) enqueues:
  Exec completed (...) :: <output>
- then requests heartbeat wake with reason "exec-event"

File: dist/heartbeat-runner-U2x6TbnN.js

Current behavior:
- buildExecEventPrompt(...) builds a user-facing relay request:
  "An async command you ran earlier has completed..."
- later heartbeat delivers the resulting reply to the user

Impact and severity

• Affected users/systems/channels: direct Telegram user-facing heartbeat delivery on cron-owned isolated runs
• Severity: Medium to High (incorrect user-visible completion reports from internal cron execution)
• Frequency: Reproduced after clean runtime rebuild on the affected job
• Consequence: internal control-plane exec completion events escape into user-visible chat and produce duplicate/misleading completion messages

Additional information

• This issue is distinct from stale lastHeartbeatText inheritance and from missing exec-event body bugs.
• In this reproduction, the bug persisted after rebuilding ~/.openclaw, which rules out stale migrated runtime state as the primary cause.
• The minimal safe fix is to suppress notifyOnExit / user-facing exec-event relay for cron-owned internal exec runs, or otherwise mark cron-owned exec completion events so heartbeat consumes them internally instead of relaying them to the user.