Node + tsx '__name is not a function' Crash

Node + tsx "__name is not a function" crash

Status

This issue has been resolved. The crash no longer occurs with the current tsx version locked in package.json (4.22.3) or with recent Node releases. The documentation remains here in case a future tsx or esbuild update brings the problem back.

Original symptom

When executing OpenClaw development scripts through tsx, the process failed during startup with the following error:

[openclaw] Failed to start CLI: TypeError: __name is not a function
    at createSubsystemLogger (src/logging/subsystem.ts)
    at <caller> (src/agents/auth-profiles/constants.ts)

Line numbers have been excluded because both files have changed since the original crash occurred, and the specific lines no longer correspond.

This error surfaced after development scripts moved from Bun to tsx (2871657e, 2026-01-06) to make Bun optional. The equivalent workflow using Bun did not crash. The issue was first seen on Node v25.3.0 running macOS; other platforms using Node 25 were also expected to be affected.

Cause

tsx converts TS and ESM code through esbuild with keepNames: true set directly in its transform configuration. This option causes esbuild to wrap named function and class declarations inside a call to a __name helper, so fn.name remains intact after minification and bundling. The crash indicates that the helper was either missing or overshadowed at the call location for that module in the specific tsx and Node combination, causing __name(...) to throw an error rather than return the wrapped value.

Current repro check

node --version
pnpm install
node --import tsx src/entry.ts status

A minimal isolated reproduction (loading only the module from the original stack trace):

node --import tsx scripts/repro/tsx-name-repro.ts

Both commands currently complete without errors. If either raises __name is not a function again, record the exact Node version, the tsx version (node_modules/tsx/package.json), and the full stack trace before reporting the issue upstream.

Workarounds (if the crash returns)

Use Bun instead of node --import tsx to run development scripts.
Execute pnpm tsgo for type checking, then run the compiled output rather than the source through tsx:
```
pnpm tsgo
node openclaw.mjs status
```
Try a different tsx version (changing pnpm add -D tsx@<version> is a dependency update that requires approval per repository policy) to determine whether the esbuild version it bundles reintroduced the bug.
Test on a different Node major or minor release to check whether the failure depends on the version.

Node + tsx '__name is not a function' Crash Resolution