Control UI Usage Badge

Show per-message token usage under every assistant reply in the browser Control UI chat.

Step 0 — ALWAYS ensure it is applied (do this first, every activation)

The badge is a client-side patch injected into dist/control-ui. It is not shipped automatically:

• A fresh openclaw skills install only copies skill files. Nothing is patched until apply.sh runs.
• Every openclaw update replaces dist/, wiping the patch.

So on every use, run the idempotent ensure script before claiming it works:

bash scripts/apply.sh     # installs/repairs the patch; safe to re-run
bash scripts/status.sh    # prints PATCHED / NOT PATCHED, asset, version

Then tell the user to hard-refresh the Control UI tab (Ctrl+Shift+R) so the Service Worker does not serve a stale copy. Never report "installed" without having run apply.sh.

What it does

• Client-side only. It monkeypatches window.WebSocket to scan the JSON frames the Control UI already receives (chat.history, chat.startup, run events) and appends a compact line to any assistant message that already renders text:

  *↑23.4k · ↓373 · Σ48.8k · cache 25.1k read (51.8%) · ⏱1m56s · ⚡3.2t/s · deepseek-v4.1-flash · ~$0.0037*

• The gateway transcript, memory files, and every other channel are untouched.

• No config change, no gateway restart — only static files under dist/control-ui/.

Why this exists: the built-in messages.responseUsage / /usage footer only applies to deliverable channels (Discord, Telegram, Feishu, WeChat …). The Control UI's webchat is not a deliverable channel, so that footer never renders there. The Control UI has no native per-message usage UI, but chat.history responses already carry a usage object per assistant message — this surfaces it.

Requirement

Write access to the Control UI directory (default /usr/local/lib/node_modules/openclaw/dist/control-ui). The scripts auto-use sudo -n when that dir is not writable. Override the path with OPENCLAW_CONTROL_UI_DIR=/path/to/dist/control-ui (also useful when OpenClaw is installed under a user prefix, where no sudo is needed at all).

Install / Update

bash scripts/apply.sh

Idempotent: backs up index.html to index.html.oc-usage-bak once, copies assets/oc-usage-badge.js into dist/control-ui/assets/, and injects <script src="./assets/oc-usage-badge.js?v=<content-hash>"></script> before </head>.

To change behaviour, edit assets/oc-usage-badge.js, then re-run apply.sh. The ?v=<hash> query changes with the content, busting the Control UI Service Worker's cache-first rule for /assets/ (otherwise a stale copy is served).

Uninstall

bash scripts/remove.sh

Check status

bash scripts/status.sh

Auto-heal after openclaw update (optional, recommended)

apply.sh is idempotent, so a recurring re-apply keeps the badge alive across updates. Create an OpenClaw cron job (isolated, low frequency):

schedule: every 6h
payload : agentTurn
message : Run `bash ~/.openclaw/workspace/skills/control-ui-usage-badge/scripts/apply.sh`
          and reply with just its output. Do nothing else.

Or run scripts/apply.sh from any existing startup/heartbeat routine you already have.

Verify

DevTools console (F12) after a reload:

• [oc-usage-badge] installed v1.2 → the script loaded.
• [oc-usage-badge] annotated a frame → frames were annotated.
• Assistant messages show the usage line.

Offline logic check: node scripts/test-badge.js (set HISTORY_JSON to a chat.history payload with messages[]).

Tunable fields (CONFIG in assets/oc-usage-badge.js)

All fields are boolean toggles at the top of the asset. Defaults: input, output, total, cacheRead, cachePct, cacheWrite, cost, duration, throughput, model, warn = on; provider, toolCalls = off. Edit, then re-run apply.sh.

Cost

cost shows the provider-reported cost when it is > 0. When the provider does not report cost (common for some gateways), fill the PRICES table in the asset (USD per 1,000,000 tokens) to show an estimated ~$…:

var PRICES = {
  "deepseek-v4.1-flash": { in: 0.14, out: 0.28, cacheRead: 0.014 },
};

Field meanings

Troubleshooting

• Nothing shows, no console logs → the script never loaded: check CSP (script-src 'self' allows same-origin), a reverse proxy, or a PWA/SW cache.
• installed but no annotated → chat data is not arriving via the intercepted WS frames; confirm the gateway client uses global WebSocket and frames are {type:"res"|"event"} JSON strings.
• Was working, then stopped → almost always openclaw update wiped dist/. status.sh will say NOT PATCHED; re-run apply.sh.
• Rollback → scripts/remove.sh.

Limits

• Only annotates assistant messages that already render text (tool-only messages are skipped).
• The newest live reply shows the line after the page next loads history / reloads — not mid-stream. Extending to run-completion events is possible but not implemented here.