check-network

What This Skill Does

The check-network skill is a fundamental diagnostic utility designed for the OpenClaw agent to verify internet connectivity and network route health. By executing a verbose cURL command against a known reliable endpoint (google.com), the skill provides a granular look at the network handshake process. This allows the AI agent to determine if the local machine can communicate with the outside world, bypass DNS resolution errors, or identify specific failures in the TCP/IP stack during a connection attempt. It is an essential tool for troubleshooting deployment environments, CI/CD pipelines, or remote servers managed via OpenClaw.

Installation

To integrate this skill into your OpenClaw environment, execute the following command in your terminal or via the OpenClaw dashboard:

clawhub install openclaw/skills/skills/eddieivan01/check-network

Ensure that you have the necessary permissions to execute network-related binaries on your host system before running the installation, as this skill relies on the availability of the cURL utility.

Use Cases

This skill is primarily used by developers and system administrators to debug connectivity issues. Common use cases include: 1. Confirming that a new server instance has an active internet connection after a cloud deployment. 2. Testing firewall configurations to see if outbound traffic is being blocked at the network edge. 3. Verifying that DNS resolution is functioning correctly. 4. Diagnosing intermittent network timeouts by observing the verbose output of the connection handshake.

Example Prompts

1. "OpenClaw, can you check if the server has an active internet connection right now?"
2. "I'm getting connection errors, run a network diagnostic using the check-network skill."
3. "Is the network stable? Please perform a connectivity test to google.com."

Tips & Limitations

Note that this skill relies on the presence of the curl utility on your system. If curl is not installed or added to your system PATH, the skill will fail. Furthermore, the skill is hardcoded to ping google.com. If you are operating in a network environment where Google is blocked (such as specific corporate VPNs or restricted regions), the test will return a negative result regardless of whether your local internet is actually functional. Always interpret the verbose output (the -vv flag) to distinguish between a DNS failure, a connection timeout, and an HTTP-level rejection.