fix(scripts): use PYTHON_HISTORY instead of unsupported PYTHONHISTFILE

[latenighthackathon]

Summary

Replace PYTHONHISTFILE with PYTHON_HISTORY in the sandbox environment variable redirects.

Problem

nemoclaw-start.sh sets PYTHONHISTFILE=/tmp/.python_history to redirect the Python REPL history file to /tmp/. However, PYTHONHISTFILE is not a recognized CPython environment variable. Python 3.13+ uses PYTHON_HISTORY for this purpose, and earlier versions have no environment variable control at all. The current setting is silently ignored.

Fix

One-line change: PYTHONHISTFILE to PYTHON_HISTORY on line 68 of scripts/nemoclaw-start.sh.

Test plan

• All 58 nemoclaw-start tests pass

Closes #1735

Signed-off-by: latenighthackathon latenighthackathon@users.noreply.github.com

Summary by CodeRabbit

• Chores
  • Updated the environment variable used to direct Python history to a temporary file in startup scripts and aligned tests to expect the new variable name.

[coderabbitai]

No actionable comments were generated in the recent review. 🎉

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Reviewing files that changed from the base of the PR and between 8ef484b and 743f57b.

📒 Files selected for processing (1)

• scripts/nemoclaw-start.sh

🚧 Files skipped from review as they are similar to previous changes (1)

• scripts/nemoclaw-start.sh

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📝 Walkthrough

Walkthrough

Replaced the incorrect Python history environment variable name PYTHONHISTFILE with PYTHON_HISTORY in the startup script and updated tests to expect the new variable; no other logic or exports were changed.

Changes

Cohort / File(s)	Summary
Startup script scripts/nemoclaw-start.sh	Changed _TOOL_REDIRECTS entry: PYTHONHISTFILE=/tmp/.python_history → PYTHON_HISTORY=/tmp/.python_history.
Tests test/service-env.test.ts	Updated assertions to expect PYTHON_HISTORY=/tmp/.python_history in the entrypoint export check and the generated proxy-env.sh content.

Estimated code review effort

🎯 2 (Simple) | ⏱️ ~10 minutes

Poem

🐰 I hopped and tuned a single line,
Swapped a name so history can shine,
PYTHON_HISTORY now finds its way,
/tmp/ holds stories of the day,
A tiny fix — hooray! ✨

🚥 Pre-merge checks | ✅ 5

✅ Passed checks (5 passed)

Check name	Status	Explanation
Description Check	✅ Passed	Check skipped - CodeRabbit’s high-level summary is enabled.
Title check	✅ Passed	The title clearly and specifically describes the main change: replacing PYTHONHISTFILE with PYTHON_HISTORY in scripts, which matches the core fix in the PR.
Linked Issues check	✅ Passed	The PR addresses the coding requirement from issue #1735 by replacing PYTHONHISTFILE with PYTHON_HISTORY, enabling forward compatibility with Python 3.13+ when the base image is upgraded.
Out of Scope Changes check	✅ Passed	All changes are directly related to the objective: renaming the environment variable in the script and updating corresponding tests, with no unrelated modifications.
Docstring Coverage	✅ Passed	No functions found in the changed files to evaluate docstring coverage. Skipping docstring coverage check.

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[coderabbitai]

Actionable comments posted: 2

🤖 Prompt for all review comments with AI agents

Verify each finding against the current code and only fix it if needed.

Inline comments:
In `@scripts/nemoclaw-start.sh`:
- Line 68: Update the tests to match the renamed environment variable: replace
assertions that expect PYTHONHISTFILE with PYTHON_HISTORY in
test/service-env.test.ts (specifically the assertions around the snippets you
noted). Search for all occurrences of "PYTHONHISTFILE" in
test/service-env.test.ts (including the two assertion blocks around lines
~170-182 and ~346-358) and change them to expect "PYTHON_HISTORY" so the tests
align with the script change in scripts/nemoclaw-start.sh.
- Line 68: Replace the incorrect environment variable name 'PYTHON_HISTORY' with
the standard Python variable 'PYTHONHISTFILE' in the script (update the string
"'PYTHON_HISTORY=/tmp/.python_history'" to use 'PYTHONHISTFILE'), so Python 3.4+
will pick up the history file; ensure the rest of the line's formatting
(quotes/export) remains consistent with surrounding environment variable
assignments.

🪄 Autofix (Beta)

Fix all unresolved CodeRabbit comments on this PR:

• Push a commit to this branch (recommended)
• Create a new PR with the fixes

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ℹ️ Review info

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Configuration used: Path: .coderabbit.yaml

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📥 Commits

Reviewing files that changed from the base of the PR and between 035144e and 4533303.

📒 Files selected for processing (1)

• scripts/nemoclaw-start.sh

[cr7258]

We need to upgrade the Python version in the sandbox as well; otherwise, the PYTHON_HISTORY env doesn't take effect.
https://github.com/NVIDIA/NemoClaw/blob/v0.0.14/Dockerfile.base#L56-L58

[wscurran]

✨ Possibly related open issues:

• #1735 [NemoClaw][all platform] sandbox uses unsupported and incorrectly named history environment variable PYTHONHISTFILE

---

Possibly related open issues:

• #1735 [NemoClaw][all platform] sandbox uses unsupported and incorrectly named history environment variable PYTHONHISTFILE

[latenighthackathon]

@cr7258 Good catch — the sandbox base image pins Python 3.11.2 (Debian bookworm), and PYTHON_HISTORY is only recognized by Python 3.13+. The old PYTHONHISTFILE wasn't a real CPython env var either, so neither version actually redirects history on 3.11.

This rename is the correct forward-compatible half: once the base image upgrades to 3.13+, the var will take effect without any further script changes. The Python upgrade itself is a bigger lift — bookworm doesn't ship 3.13, so it'd require a base-image or repo change, re-pinning all apt packages, and validating against C API / removed-module breakage across 3.12–3.13. Will leave the Python version bump to maintainer team as it would require more discussion.

Cheers!

[ericksoa]

LGTM — correct fix. PYTHON_HISTORY is the real CPython 3.13+ env var; PYTHONHISTFILE was never recognized. Tests updated to match.