manifestClaude Skill

Manifest — LLM Router & Observability for OpenClaw

Manifest is an OpenClaw plugin that:

• Routes every request to the most cost-effective model via a 23-dimension scoring algorithm (<2ms latency)
• Tracks costs and tokens in a real-time dashboard
• Sets limits with email alerts and hard spending caps

Source: github.com/mnfst/manifest — MIT licensed. Homepage: manifest.build

Setup (Cloud — default)

Three commands, no coding:

openclaw plugins install manifest
openclaw config set plugins.entries.manifest.config.apiKey "mnfst_YOUR_KEY"
openclaw gateway restart

Get the API key at app.manifest.build → create an account → create an agent → copy the mnfst_* key.

After restart, the plugin auto-configures:

• Adds manifest/auto to the model allowlist (does not change your current default)
• Injects the manifest provider into ~/.openclaw/openclaw.json
• Starts exporting OTLP telemetry to app.manifest.build
• Exposes three agent tools: manifest_usage, manifest_costs, manifest_health

Dashboard at app.manifest.build. Telemetry arrives within 10-30 seconds (batched OTLP export).

Verify connection

openclaw manifest

Shows: mode, endpoint reachability, auth validity, agent name.

Configuration Changes

On plugin registration, Manifest writes to these files:

File	Change	Reversible
~/.openclaw/openclaw.json	Adds models.providers.manifest provider entry; adds manifest/auto to agents.defaults.models allowlist	Yes — openclaw plugins uninstall manifest
~/.openclaw/agents/*/agent/auth-profiles.json	Adds manifest:default auth profile	Yes — uninstall removes it
~/.openclaw/manifest/config.json	Stores auto-generated API key (local mode only, file mode 0600)	Yes — delete ~/.openclaw/manifest/
~/.openclaw/manifest/manifest.db	SQLite database (local mode only)	Yes — delete the file

No other files are modified. The plugin does not change your current default model.

Install Provenance

openclaw plugins install manifest installs the manifest npm package.

• Source: github.com/mnfst/manifest (packages/openclaw-plugin/)
• License: MIT
• Author: MNFST Inc.

Verify before installing:

npm view manifest repository.url
npm view manifest dist.integrity

Setup (Local — offline alternative)

Use local mode only when data must never leave the machine.

openclaw plugins install manifest
openclaw config set plugins.entries.manifest.config.mode local
openclaw gateway restart

Dashboard opens at http://127.0.0.1:2099. Data stored locally in ~/.openclaw/manifest/manifest.db. No account or API key needed.

To expose over Tailscale (requires Tailscale on both devices, only accessible within your Tailnet): tailscale serve --bg 2099

What Manifest Answers

Manifest answers these questions about your OpenClaw agents — via the dashboard or directly in-conversation via agent tools:

Spending & budget

• How much have I spent today / this week / this month?
• What's my cost breakdown by model?
• Which model consumes the biggest share of my budget?
• Am I approaching my spending limit?

Token consumption

• How many tokens has my agent used (input vs. output)?
• What's my token trend compared to the previous period?
• How much cache am I reading vs. writing?

Activity & performance

• How many LLM calls has my agent made?
• How long do LLM calls take (latency)?
• Are there errors or rate limits occurring? What are the error messages?
• Which skills/tools are running and how often?

Routing intelligence

• What routing tier (simple/standard/complex/reasoning) was each request assigned?
• Why was a specific tier chosen?
• What model pricing is available across all providers?

Connectivity

• Is Manifest connected and healthy?
• Is telemetry flowing correctly?

Agent Tools

Three tools are available to the agent in-conversation:

Tool	Trigger phrases	What it returns
manifest_usage	"how many tokens", "token usage", "consumption"	Total, input, output, cache-read tokens + action count for today/week/month
manifest_costs	"how much spent", "costs", "money burned"	Cost breakdown by model in USD for today/week/month
manifest_health	"is monitoring working", "connectivity test"	Endpoint reachable, auth valid, agent name, status

Each accepts a period parameter: "today", "week", or "month".

All three tools are read-only — they query the agent's own usage data and never send message content.

LLM Routing

When the model is set to manifest/auto, the router scores each conversation across 23 dimensions and assigns one of 4 tiers:

Tier	Use case	Examples
Simple	Greetings, confirmations, short lookups	"hi", "yes", "what time is it"
Standard	General tasks, balanced quality/cost	"summarize this", "write a test"
Complex	Multi-step reasoning, nuanced analysis	"compare these architectures", "debug this stack trace"
Reasoning	Formal logic, proofs, critical planning	"prove this theorem", "design a migration strategy"

Each tier maps to a model. Default models are auto-assigned per provider, but overridable in the dashboard under Routing.

Short-circuit rules:

• Messages <50 chars with no tools → Simple
• Formal logic keywords → Reasoning
• Tools present → floor at Standard
• Context >50k tokens → floor at Complex

Dashboard Pages

Page	What it shows
Workspace	All connected agents as cards with sparkline activity charts
Overview	Per-agent cost, tokens, messages with trend badges and time-series charts
Messages	Full paginated message log with filters (status, model, cost range)
Routing	4-tier model config, provider connections, enable/disable routing
Limits	Email alerts and hard spending caps (tokens or cost, per hour/day/week/month)
Settings	Agent rename, delete, OTLP key management
Model Prices	Sortable table of 300+ model prices across all providers

Supported Providers

Anthropic, OpenAI, Google Gemini, DeepSeek, xAI, Mistral AI, Qwen, MiniMax, Kimi, Amazon Nova, Z.ai, OpenRouter, Ollama. 300+ models total.

Uninstall

openclaw plugins uninstall manifest
openclaw gateway restart

This removes the plugin, provider config, and auth profiles. After uninstalling, manifest/auto is no longer available. If any agent uses it, switch to another model.

Troubleshooting

Telemetry not appearing: The gateway batches OTLP data every 10-30 seconds. Wait, then check openclaw manifest for connection status.

Auth errors in cloud mode: Verify the API key starts with mnfst_ and matches the key in the dashboard under Settings → Agent setup.

Port conflict in local mode: If port 2099 is busy, the plugin checks if the existing process is Manifest and reuses it. To change the port: openclaw config set plugins.entries.manifest.config.port <PORT>.

Plugin conflicts: Manifest conflicts with the built-in diagnostics-otel plugin. Disable it before enabling Manifest.

After backend restart: Always restart the gateway too (openclaw gateway restart) — the OTLP pipeline doesn't auto-reconnect.

Privacy

External Endpoints

Endpoint	When	Data Sent
{endpoint}/v1/traces	Every LLM call (batched 10-30s)	OTLP spans (see fields below)
{endpoint}/v1/metrics	Every 10-30s	Counters: request count, token totals, tool call counts — grouped by model/provider
{endpoint}/api/v1/routing/resolve	Only when model is manifest/auto	Last 10 non-system/non-developer messages ({role, content} only)
https://eu.i.posthog.com	On plugin register	Hashed machine ID, OS, Node version, plugin version, mode. No PII. Opt out: MANIFEST_TELEMETRY_OPTOUT=1

OTLP Span Fields

Exhaustive list of attributes sent per span:

• openclaw.session.key — opaque session identifier
• openclaw.message.channel — message channel name
• gen_ai.request.model — model name (e.g. "claude-sonnet-4-20250514")
• gen_ai.system — provider name (e.g. "anthropic")
• gen_ai.usage.input_tokens — integer
• gen_ai.usage.output_tokens — integer
• gen_ai.usage.cache_read_input_tokens — integer
• gen_ai.usage.cache_creation_input_tokens — integer
• openclaw.agent.name — agent identifier
• tool.name — tool name string
• tool.success — boolean
• manifest.routing.tier — routing tier (if routed)
• manifest.routing.reason — routing reason (if routed)
• Error status: agent errors truncated to 500 chars; tool errors include event.error.message untruncated

Not collected: user prompts, assistant responses, tool input/output arguments, file contents, or any message body.

Routing Data

• Only active when model is manifest/auto
• Excludes messages with role: "system" or role: "developer"
• Sends only {role, content} — all other message properties are stripped (routing.ts:77)
• 3-second timeout, non-blocking
• To avoid sending content: disable routing in the dashboard or set a fixed model

Credential Storage

• Cloud mode: API key stored in ~/.openclaw/openclaw.json under plugins.entries.manifest.config.apiKey (managed by OpenClaw's standard plugin config)
• Local mode: auto-generated key stored in ~/.openclaw/manifest/config.json with file mode 0600

Local Mode

All data stays on your machine. No external calls except optional PostHog analytics (opt out with MANIFEST_TELEMETRY_OPTOUT=1).