Configure Inference Timeouts
NemoClaw uses separate time budgets for agent requests, local provider validation, sandbox readiness, and recovery. Change the budget that matches the phase that times out.
Choose the Timeout
Use the error location to select the correct setting.
The readiness timeout does not govern inference requests or provider validation.
NEMOCLAW_AGENT_TIMEOUT requires a positive integer; onboarding rejects any other value.
NEMOCLAW_ONBOARD_VALIDATION_TIMEOUT_SECONDS accepts positive finite seconds, rounds fractional values up, and caps higher values at 600 seconds. An unset or invalid value preserves the probe defaults. NemoClaw raises each connection or total deadline only when the value exceeds that deadline.
NEMOCLAW_LOCAL_INFERENCE_TIMEOUT and NEMOCLAW_SANDBOX_READY_TIMEOUT accept finite, nonnegative seconds, round fractional values, and use their defaults for invalid or negative values.
NEMOCLAW_GATEWAY_RECOVERY_WAIT_SECONDS accepts finite, nonnegative seconds and preserves fractional values.
A valid value overrides the internal budget for the current recovery phase.
An unset, blank, invalid, or negative value uses 30 seconds for OpenClaw gateway health, 90 seconds for Hermes gateway health, and 120 seconds for post-recovery OpenShell readiness when the recovery path does not supply another budget.
Increase the OpenClaw Request Timeout
Increase NEMOCLAW_AGENT_TIMEOUT for a slow model server, such as CPU-only local inference or modest vLLM hardware.
NemoClaw writes this value to agents.defaults.timeoutSeconds and models.providers.<provider-id>.timeoutSeconds during onboarding.
This setting writes the initial OpenClaw config during onboarding. OpenClaw owns that config after first launch.
Each key bounds a different deadline.
agents.defaults.timeoutSeconds bounds one agent run, and nemoclaw <name> agent --timeout <seconds> overrides it for a single run.
models.providers.<provider-id>.timeoutSeconds bounds one provider request, and no flag overrides it.
Raise the provider key when a turn times out while waiting for the model server, because a longer --timeout does not extend the provider request.
For an existing sandbox, identify the native provider used by the request:
In provider/model, the provider portion is the native provider key, such as inference, openai, or anthropic.
It is not the OpenShell provider ID.
If the affected agent uses another model, use that model’s provider key.
Replace <provider-id> below with that native key.
Set both deadlines when you want a 1,800-second agent run and provider request:
Verify both values and validate the configuration:
Both reads must return 1800, and validation must succeed.
Restart the gateway to apply the changes; this interrupts active agent requests.
Increase the Provider Validation Timeout
On any platform, increase NEMOCLAW_ONBOARD_VALIDATION_TIMEOUT_SECONDS when an applicable OpenAI-compatible provider validation request times out before the provider replies.
NemoClaw automatically prints this recovery advice after WSL2 transport failures.
This setting only raises applicable provider-validation connection and total deadlines, up to 600 seconds. It includes the dedicated DeepSeek V4 Pro streaming validation profile, but it does not extend the separate fixed five-second streaming-event probe. Standard WSL2 validation starts with a 20-second connection and 30-second total floor. Extended NVIDIA validation starts with 30 and 300 seconds on WSL2 or 10 and 300 seconds elsewhere, so an override must exceed each existing deadline to raise it.
Increase the Local Validation Timeout
For validation paths that read NEMOCLAW_LOCAL_INFERENCE_TIMEOUT, raise it when the inference-server validation request needs more than 180 seconds.
Large prompts, cold local model loads, and slower hardware can require a larger budget.
Local Ollama setup treats host-side curl timeouts as retryable probe failures and retries with a larger timeout before reporting validation failure. This variable does not extend the later sandbox-readiness wait.
Increase the Sandbox Readiness Timeout
Raise NEMOCLAW_SANDBOX_READY_TIMEOUT when onboarding creates the sandbox but image build, upload, or boot exceeds 180 seconds.
This can occur during a first run with cold caches or on a remote VM over a slow link.
Increase the Recovery Wait
Set NEMOCLAW_GATEWAY_RECOVERY_WAIT_SECONDS when OpenShell needs more than 120 seconds to re-register the sandbox after onboarding applies policy presets.
Managed OpenClaw gateway health uses 30 seconds by default.
After an intentional stop, nemoclaw <sandbox-name> start uses the same default to wait for the native gateway before checking health and restoring host forwards.
The startup budget includes probe execution and delays.
If it expires, start exits nonzero without proceeding to those checks.
Set NEMOCLAW_GATEWAY_RECOVERY_WAIT_SECONDS before start to override this budget.
Set NEMOCLAW_GATEWAY_RECOVERY_WAIT_SECONDS before start or recover to extend the agent-specific gateway-health wait and the 120-second post-recovery OpenShell readiness wait.
A valid finite, nonnegative recovery override takes precedence over internal per-agent and per-call-site budgets.
Raise both onboarding budgets when the provider probe and the later sandbox creation phase are slow.
Related Topics
- Configure Model Limits for context-window and output-token settings.
- Verify the Sandbox Inference Route after onboarding completes.