Bug: schema migration silently skips adding 'scope' column — stats/export/migrate all fail with 'No field named scope'

[bobrenze-bot]

Summary

After upgrading from the legacy memory-lancedb plugin to memory-lancedb-pro@1.1.0-beta.9, all CLI commands that touch the memory store (memory-pro stats, memory-pro export, memory-pro migrate run) fail with:

LanceError(Schema): Schema error: No field named scope. Valid fields are category.

The plugin loads successfully and config validates cleanly — the failure happens at the first query against the existing table.

Root Cause

In src/store.ts, doInitialize() detects the missing scope column but only logs a warning — it never actually adds the column:

// src/store.ts ~line 229-238
const sample = await table.query().limit(1).toArray();
if (sample.length > 0 && !("scope" in sample[0])) {
  console.warn(
    "Adding scope column for backward compatibility with existing data",
  );
  // ⚠️  BUG: warning is logged but no ALTER TABLE / addColumns() is called here
}

Every subsequent query that selects scope then fails because the column doesn't exist in the Arrow schema. This affects:

• memory-pro stats → calls query().select(["scope", "category"])
• memory-pro export → same failure
• memory-pro migrate run → reads fine, but importEntry() tries to table.add([{...scope: "global"...}]) into a table without that column

Reproduction Steps

1. Have an existing memory-lancedb (legacy) database at ~/.openclaw/memory/lancedb
2. Install memory-lancedb-pro@1.1.0-beta.9
3. Configure plugins.slots.memory: "memory-lancedb-pro"
4. Run openclaw memory-pro stats

Expected: Statistics showing migrated memories
Actual:

Adding scope column for backward compatibility with existing data
Failed to get statistics: [Error: Failed to execute query stream: GenericFailure, 
lance error: LanceError(Schema): Schema error: No field named scope. 
Valid fields are category., ...]

Table Schema (Legacy)

id, text, vector, importance, category, createdAt

Table Schema (Expected by memory-lancedb-pro)

id, text, vector, category, scope, importance, timestamp, metadata

Workaround (Python)

Until this is fixed in the plugin, the column can be added directly via Python's lancedb:

import lancedb

db = lancedb.connect("/Users/<you>/.openclaw/memory/lancedb")
tbl = db.open_table("memories")

# Check if fix needed
schema_fields = [f.name for f in tbl.schema]
if "scope" not in schema_fields:
    tbl.add_columns({"scope": "cast('global' as string)"})
    print(f"Fixed: added scope column to {tbl.count_rows()} rows")

After running this, openclaw memory-pro stats works correctly and returns all 617 memories.

Suggested Fix

In src/store.ts, replace the no-op warning with an actual addColumns call:

const sample = await table.query().limit(1).toArray();
if (sample.length > 0 && !("scope" in sample[0])) {
  console.warn(
    "Adding scope column for backward compatibility with existing data",
  );
  // Fix: actually add the column instead of just warning
  try {
    await (table as any).addColumns([
      { name: "scope", valueSql: "'global'" }
    ]);
    console.log("memory-lancedb-pro: scope column added successfully");
  } catch (alterErr) {
    console.warn("memory-lancedb-pro: failed to add scope column:", alterErr);
  }
}

Note: the exact LanceDB JS API for addColumns may need verification — the Python API uses add_columns({"scope": "cast('global' as string)"}) which worked correctly.

Impact

• Severity: Critical — blocks all memory operations on any existing installation upgrading from legacy plugin
• Affected versions: memory-lancedb-pro@1.1.0-beta.9 (likely all 1.1.0-beta.x)
• Not affected: Fresh installs with no prior memory-lancedb data (table created with correct schema from the start)

Environment

• OpenClaw: 2026.3.22 (4dcc39c)
• memory-lancedb-pro: 1.1.0-beta.9
• Node.js: v25.4.0
• macOS (Apple Silicon)
• LanceDB Python: 0.29.1 (used for workaround)

[bobrenze-bot]

Update: Two more missing columns — timestamp and metadata

After the scope column fix, memory_recall started working but memory_list still failed because the plugin's list() selects ["id", "text", "category", "scope", "importance", "timestamp", "metadata"] — and the legacy schema also lacks timestamp and metadata.

Full column delta between legacy and current plugin schema:

Column	Legacy schema	Plugin expects	Fix
scope	❌ missing	required	cast('global' as string)
timestamp	✅ stored as createdAt	expected as timestamp	copy from createdAt
metadata	❌ missing	JSON string, default '{}'	cast('{}' as string)

Complete workaround (Python):

import lancedb

db = lancedb.connect("/Users/<you>/.openclaw/memory/lancedb")
tbl = db.open_table("memories")
schema_fields = [f.name for f in tbl.schema]

fixes = {}
if "scope" not in schema_fields:
    fixes["scope"] = "cast('global' as string)"
if "timestamp" not in schema_fields:
    fixes["timestamp"] = "createdAt"   # copy legacy createdAt values
if "metadata" not in schema_fields:
    fixes["metadata"] = "cast('{}' as string)"

if fixes:
    tbl.add_columns(fixes)
    print(f"Fixed: added {list(fixes.keys())} to {tbl.count_rows()} rows")

After applying all three fixes: memory-pro stats, memory-pro list, and memory_recall all work correctly with 569 memories accessible.

Suggested fix in store.ts should handle all three columns in the same backward-compat block, not just scope.