Anthropy Works
Progress and Demo Guide
Anthropy Works is an operations center for managed service providers. It helps teams see customer environments, deploy and manage OpenClaw, attach reusable capabilities, and prepare safe connections to business tools.
System Summary
What Anthropy Works Is
Anthropy Works gives an MSP one place to understand customer organizations, managed machines, OpenClaw instances, reusable AI capabilities, and future SaaS connections. The platform is designed to make every important action visible, approved, and recorded. Workflow approvals now let work pause for a person before sensitive steps continue, and recovery checks help stale work fail safely after restarts.
Phase Timeline
From Empty Repo To Working Platform
Foundation
Created the local app, database, cache, and first login screen.
CompleteMission Control Login
Added real sign-in, organization records, admin roles, and activity history.
CompleteNodes
Added the first view of managed machines and their basic status.
CompleteAgent Check-In
Allowed a machine agent to register and send health updates.
CompleteContainer Inventory
Added safe reporting of containers running on a managed machine.
CompleteOpenClaw Discovery
Started detecting likely OpenClaw environments without changing them.
CompleteOpenClaw Bundle
Prepared the standard OpenClaw package and readiness checks.
CompleteDeployment Planning
Added safe job requests and typed approval before deployment.
CompleteLifecycle Actions
Added health checks, log viewing, and controlled gateway restart.
CompleteSafety Rules
Added stronger checks, warnings, and records for blocked actions.
CompleteAgent-Run Operations
Moved operations so the agent performs work on the managed machine.
CompleteAgent Identity
Added per-machine agent credentials and safer job access.
CompleteReal OpenClaw Deployment
Deployed the first controlled OpenClaw instance through the agent.
CompleteOpenClaw Takeover
Added safe promotion of discovered OpenClaw environments into managed records.
CompleteCapabilities
Added the catalog for skills, tools, policies, and reusable capability packs.
CompleteConnections
Added connection records and a safe placeholder for future SaaS integrations.
CompleteWorkflows
Added step-by-step workflow definitions and simulated execution logs.
CompleteWorkflow Rules
Added checks that stop workflow steps when capabilities or connections are not allowed.
CompletePermission Controls
Added screens for admins to manage which capability actions are allowed.
CompleteFirst External Action
Added one safe Google Drive file-list action through workflow rules and connection policy.
CompleteArchitecture Hardening
Documented core guarantees and added regression tests for safety rules.
CompleteWorkflow Approvals
Added human confirmation pauses and safe resume for workflow steps.
CompleteReliability and Recovery
Added safe recovery for stale jobs, stale agents, and interrupted workflows.
CompleteTenancy and UI Design Lock
Locked tenancy, permissions, UI segmentation, and instance-type direction in docs with small UI clarity updates.
CompleteBrowser E2E Tests
Added Playwright browser tests for login, core records, workflows, and the report site.
CompleteProduction Readiness Gate
Added environment definitions, readiness checks, backup and restore scripts, and deployment runbooks.
CompleteLive Report Site
Deployed the product-facing status report to Cloudflare Pages with the canonical custom domain.
CompleteWhat Works Now
- Team members can sign in to the mission control interface.
- Admins can create customer organizations.
- Admins can add and review managed machines.
- The local agent can register a machine and keep its status fresh.
- The system can show container inventory from managed machines.
- The system can detect likely OpenClaw environments without changing them.
- Admins can deploy a new OpenClaw instance through an approved job.
- Admins can take over an existing OpenClaw record after confirmation.
- Admins can run health checks, view logs, and request a controlled gateway restart.
- Admins can create reusable capability records and capability packs.
- Admins can create connection records for tools like ServiceTitan, Google Drive, QuickBooks, and Composio.
- Admins can create workflows, run them step by step in simulation, and review the results.
- Workflow steps are checked against rules before they run, and unsafe steps are blocked.
- Admins can manage capability permissions that control allowed actions and risk levels.
- A workflow can run one approved Google Drive file-list action through a connected record.
- External action results are labeled as Stub or Live Data so demos stay clear.
- Workflows can pause for human confirmation and resume after the phrase is typed correctly.
- Jobs show retry counts, timeout windows, recovery state, and clear failure reasons.
- Machines with old check-ins are marked stale or offline instead of disappearing.
- Interrupted workflows fail safely, while workflows waiting for approval stay paused.
- Browser E2E tests now verify the most important user paths from the running web app.
- Core architecture rules are documented and covered by backend regression tests.
- Baseline production checks now verify configuration, database access, service readiness, bundle readiness, and secret redaction.
- Backup and restore helpers now exist for the local database.
- A deployment runbook explains startup, verification, restart, rollback, and recovery steps.
How To Use It
- Sign in to mission control.
- Create a customer organization.
- Add a managed machine for that customer or for shared infrastructure.
- Register the agent on the machine so it can check in.
- Deploy OpenClaw to a managed machine after approval.
- Manage the OpenClaw instance with safe health, logs, and restart actions.
- Attach capabilities that describe what the organization or instance is allowed to use.
- Attach connection records that prepare the system for future SaaS access.
- Create a workflow that uses capabilities and connections, then run it in simulation.
- For Google Drive, add the list files action to the workflow and review the returned file list.
- Turn on confirmation for a capability permission and run the workflow to see it pause.
- Type the displayed phrase to approve the step and continue the workflow.
- Review the Jobs page to see timeout and recovery details for operational work.
- Review the Nodes page to see whether a machine is online, stale, or offline.
- Review any blocked workflow step to see which rule stopped it.
- Adjust capability permissions to control which actions workflows may simulate.
- Run the validation script before moving to another phase.
- Run the browser E2E script when the Docker Compose stack is already running.
Demo Scenarios
What You Can Show Today
Deploy a new OpenClaw instance
Pick a customer, pick a managed machine, request deployment, type the approval phrase, and watch the job become a managed instance.
Take over an existing OpenClaw
Start with a discovered OpenClaw record, confirm promotion, and turn it into a managed record without restarting or changing the customer environment.
Attach a SaaS connection
Create a placeholder connection for a provider, mark it connected for demo purposes, and link it to a capability or OpenClaw instance.
Run lifecycle operations
Open a managed instance, run a health check, request logs, or start a controlled gateway restart with approval.
Run a workflow simulation
Create a workflow with capability and connection steps, execute it, and review the step-by-step log. Try a disallowed action to see the workflow stop safely.
Approve a workflow step
Mark a capability action as requiring confirmation, run the workflow, type the displayed phrase, and watch the workflow continue.
Recover from stale work
Restart the platform or inspect old jobs and workflows to see stale work fail safely with a clear reason instead of sitting forever.
List Google Drive files safely
Link a Google Drive connection to an allowed capability, run the list files workflow step, and see either demo data or live read-only data depending on the environment.
Manage capability rules
Open capability permissions, choose a capability and organization, set allowed actions, and see workflow validation follow those rules.
Run browser validation
Use the Playwright suite to check login, records, workflows, and the report site from a real browser without triggering OpenClaw deployment.
System Architecture
How The Pieces Fit Together
Control plane and execution plane
The main app approves, records, and assigns work. The local agent performs approved work on the assigned machine and reports the result back.
Node and instance
A node is a machine managed or observed by the MSP. An instance is the customer environment running on a node, with OpenClaw as the current supported type.
Capability, connection, workflow
A capability describes what the platform can do. A connection represents access to a tool. A workflow combines approved capabilities and connections into ordered steps.
MSP, org, and user views
MSP operators see the full platform. Company admins should see their company's resources. Individual users should see their personal work and approved company tools.
System Guarantees
Rules The Platform Now Protects
Safe deployment
OpenClaw deployment stays confirmation-gated, isolated by project, and executed only by the agent on the assigned machine.
Controlled execution
The API approves and records work. The agent performs operational commands and cannot take jobs for another machine.
Policy enforcement
Workflow steps must pass capability, connection, and usage rules before any step can run. Steps that require approval pause instead of running automatically.
No secret leakage
Secret-looking job data is redacted before display, and audit reasons redact keyed secret values.
Recovery without surprise reruns
Timed-out jobs and interrupted workflows are marked clearly. Risky work does not restart by itself after a service restart.
Production Readiness
What Is Ready Before A Real Launch
Environment rules
Local, staging, and production use the same system with different safeguards. The production setup rejects development passwords and placeholder secrets.
Readiness checks
Operators can check whether the app, database, service queue, and OpenClaw bundle are ready before relying on the system.
Recovery path
The runbook now explains how to start the platform, verify it, back up the database, restore from backup, restart services, and roll back a release.
Secret protection
Secret-looking values are kept out of job results, audit messages, and recent service logs during validation.
Known Limitations
- Production readiness is a baseline, not a replacement for a full launch checklist.
- Secrets still come from environment configuration until a vault is added.
- Rollback steps are documented, but full rollback is not automated yet.
- The OpenClaw helper container can report an unhealthy state even when the main gateway is healthy.
- SaaS sign-in is not connected yet, so there is no OAuth flow.
- Only one outside action exists today: Google Drive file listing.
- Google Drive returns demo data unless a development-only read token is configured.
- Workflow approvals are single-person, step-level approvals only.
- Recovery runs during startup and normal status views, not as a separate background monitor yet.
- Retry information is visible, but automatic retry buttons are not available yet.
- Capability permissions can be edited, but not deleted or disabled yet.
- Connection records still do not contain real credentials.
- Composio support remains prepared, not a broad live integration.
- Browser tests do not run real OpenClaw deployment yet; that remains backend and manual validated.
What's Next
- Expand from one safe external action to a small set of approved provider actions.
- Add real OAuth and Composio account handshakes.
- Add secure credential handling with one-time secret capture and protected storage.
- Add automation so routine work can be scheduled, monitored, and reviewed.
- Add richer recovery controls such as manual retry for safe jobs and stronger agent health monitoring.
- Expand browser coverage as the future org and user interfaces are split out.