Understanding OpenClaw By Building One

I wanted to really understand how AI agents work, so I spent two weeks building one from scratch. Then I turned my learning into a step-by-step tutorial.

18 progressive steps — each adds one concept, each has runnable code. Some highlights from the journey:

• Step 0: Chat Loop — Start with the basics. Just you and the LLM, talking.
• Step 1: Tools — Give your agent the ability to take actions.
• Step 2: Skills — Dynamically load capabilities as needed.
• Step 6: Web Tools — Agent can search and read the web.
• Step 11: Multi-Agent Routing — Multiple agents, right one for the right job.
• Step 15: Agent Dispatch — Agents that can collaborate with each other.
• Step 17: Memory — Long-term knowledge that persists across sessions.

Each step is self-contained with a README + working code.

https://github.com/czl9707/build-your-own-openclaw

Hope this helpful! Feedback welcome.