Adds hermes-pack.yaml: a single YAML file pinning a set of plugins to
exact 40-char commit SHAs with optional non-secret plugins.entries
config seeds and a declared (not yet installed) skills list.
CLI:
- hermes plugins pack install <path|https-url> [--force]: mandatory
review screen (plugins + refs + declared capabilities), one summary
confirmation, then fan-out through the existing pinned install path.
Per-plugin capability consent rides the standard #64228 flow — a pack
never bulk-grants. Partial failures reported per plugin; non-zero
exit when any fail. Interactive only (no --yes in v1).
- hermes plugins pack export [--enabled-only] [--name]: pack YAML on
stdout from install metadata (repo + exact SHA); local-only plugins
become warning comments; secrets/capability grants stripped.
- hermes plugins pack show <path|url>: dry-run view.
Supply chain: refs must be exact 40-char SHAs (tags/branches rejected
naming the entry, same rule as the community index); config seeds
reject secret-shaped, capability, and allow_* keys; bare names resolve
through the community index; https-only URL fetch with size cap.
Tests: tests/hermes_cli/test_plugin_packs.py (36) — parse/validate,
SHA enforcement, mocked install fan-out, consent-per-plugin assertion,
export round-trip + sanitization, partial-failure exit code, parser
wiring. No live network.
Docs: user-guide plugins.md packs section (notes packs build on the
manifest v2 fields per #64165) + cli-commands.md rows.
Closes#64166
Adds a bundled productivity skill that lets Hermes organize the user's own
session library conversationally: find sessions by topic via session_search,
summarize goals/decisions from bookends, rename them meaningfully, propose
archives/prunes with a mandatory plan-first + dry-run discipline, and split
requests into parallel workstreams via delegate_task.
Inspired by Perplexity Computer's session management by prompt (changelog
07/27/26): find/summarize past sessions, fork focused follow-ups, rename,
pin/archive with plan-first confirmation, and fan one request out into
parallel per-task sessions.
omo's ultimate-browsing engine added a 'surrogate retrieval tier' (PR #6662):
when a page fetch is blocked by a WAF/paywall/rate-limit, it falls back to
third-party copies (Wayback, archive.today, Jina Reader) with strict
provenance labeling and validators that reject fake successes (dead Google
Cache interstitials, AMP redirect stubs, rate-limit bodies).
Hermes adaptation: a bundled research skill + stdlib-only script instead of
a Python sub-engine — zero core-tool footprint, per the footprint ladder.
Clean-room implementation (their repo is Sustainable Use License; nothing
copied), keeping the good ideas: provenance contract (snapshot vs live),
body validation over status codes, domain rotation for archive.today,
API-first pivot guidance, and explicit skip of proxy relays (MITM).
E2E tested: recovered a real 486KB Wayback snapshot with timestamp;
validators reject redirect stubs, interstitial titles, and sub-floor bodies.
Adds a 'council' synthesis style to MoA (per preset via synthesis_style,
one-shot via the new /council command on CLI + gateway). Reference models
answer independently; the aggregator chairs the deliberation and produces
a user-facing report of consensus, per-model disagreements (with the
differing assumptions behind them), unique contributions, and a
recommendation with an explicit confidence level.
Inspired by Perplexity's Model Council rollout to Perplexity Computer
(changelog 08/04/26): pick a board of 2-8 models, run them independently,
synthesize where they agree/disagree and what each uniquely surfaces.
Static machine-readable community plugin index with fuzzy search and
index-resolved installs, mirroring the Skills Hub catalog pattern
(fetch → HERMES_HOME/cache with 24h TTL → bundled seed fallback).
- hermes_cli/plugin_index.py: index fetch/cache/seed chain, fuzzy
search (name/description/tags/author + typo tolerance), capability
filter, bare-name resolution. Canonical URL overridable via
plugins.index_url config key.
- hermes_cli/data/plugin_index.json: bundled seed (offline fallback +
format reference) with 5 real ecosystem plugins, each pinned to an
exact commit SHA.
- hermes plugins search [term] [--json] [--capability] [--refresh]:
Rich table or JSON output, offline-safe, with an explicit
'indexed ≠ audited' footer.
- hermes plugins install <name>: bare names (no slash, no URL scheme)
resolve through the index to owner/repo[/subdir] @ pinned ref and
hand off to the existing install path (ref wired through the #82029
exact-ref support). Ambiguous names list candidates and exit;
explicit owner/repo and Git URL installs are untouched, and an
explicit --ref always beats the index pin.
- Docs: discovery section in user-guide plugins.md (format, submission
workflow via PR to hermes-plugin-index, security framing) and
reference/cli-commands.md rows.
- Tests: tests/hermes_cli/test_plugin_index_search.py (38 tests, no
live network) covering parsing, search, remote→cache→seed fallback,
TTL, install resolution/ambiguity/passthrough, and --json output.
The distributions guide framed export/import as local backup only, so the
new slash commands read as a competing path instead of the lightweight
half of one story. Give profile-distributions.md a comparison table up
front (git repo vs single file: updates, versioning, setup cost, what
each carries), rewrite the Not-a-fit bullets that mislabeled export, and
add a full Export/import section covering the CLI, TUI, and desktop
entry points, the desktop.json overlay, and what an archive actually
contains — including that it can carry memories and sessions, which a
distribution never does.
Also register /export and /import in the slash-command reference (they
shipped undocumented), point the profile-command entries at their chat
and desktop doors, and cover the desktop Export/Import UI on the desktop
page.
Add a non-terminal "review" status so a worker that finished implementation
can hand off for human review without abusing kanban_block. The old
kanban_block(reason="review-required: ...") convention routed the handoff
through the unblock-loop breaker, so a normal review -> changes -> review
cycle was falsely escalated to triage.
- kanban_db: request_review (running/ready -> review, non-block, emits
review_requested), reopen_review_task (review -> ready/todo, review_reopened),
complete_task accepts review -> done, and a review_dispatch gate (default off,
shared by the dispatcher loop and the gateway health probe).
- kanban_request_review worker tool + `request-review` / `reopen-review` CLI
verbs; tool wired through toolsets, EXPOSED_TOOLS, _POLISHED_TOOLS.
- Gateway notifier wakes the origin subscriber on review_requested and
block_loop_detected; the subscription survives until done/archived, so every
review cycle re-notifies.
- Dashboard PATCH + bulk route the review transitions (request_review /
reopen_review_task) and render the review column.
- goals.py goal-loop and KANBAN_GUIDANCE recognize review as a terminator.
- Docs (reference tables, user guide, AGENTS.md, zh-Hans mirrors) + tests.
needs_input / failed are unchanged: they still route through kanban_block,
still count toward block_recurrences, and still escalate to triage.
The upstream ahujasid/blender-mcp and ahujasid/ableton-mcp GitHub repos
were hijacked on 2026-08-08: the maintainer (@sidahuj) publicly reported
his account was compromised and ownership stripped, and both repos now
redirect to an attacker-controlled org (MCPBlender, created the same
day, pushing new commits since).
Although our catalog pinned blender-mcp==1.6.4 from PyPI (pre-compromise,
sha256 verified unchanged), the server is only half the bridge: the
manifest's post-install instructions and the optional skill directed
users to download addon.py — arbitrary Python executed inside Blender —
from the now-compromised GitHub repo (the raw URL currently 404s, and
the addon ships in no PyPI artifact). There is no trustworthy source
for the addon half, so the entry cannot be installed safely end-to-end.
Removing the catalog entry and skill entirely until the maintainer
confirms account recovery; re-adding is a follow-up PR once upstream
is verified clean.
- optional-mcps/blender/: removed
- optional-skills/creative/blender-mcp/: removed
- docs: catalog rows, sidebar entry, skill pages (en + zh-Hans) removed
- cross-references in unreal-mcp and kanban-video-orchestrator cleaned
The Hugging Face agent-harness registry matches standard-var values
EXACTLY against the harness id. Our registry id is 'hermes-agent'
(huggingface.js agent-harnesses.ts), so AI_AGENT=hermes was counted as
'unknown' — fixed at both entry points.
Remote terminal backends (Docker/SSH/Modal/Daytona/Singularity/Vercel)
never inherit the Hermes process env, and the cross-session leak guard
deliberately strips HERMES_SESSION_* from subprocess envs in engaged
multi-session hosts — so hf/huggingface_hub traffic from those shells was
unattributable. _wrap_command now exports AI_AGENT/HERMES_AGENT inside
every wrapped command with ${VAR:-default} semantics (outer harness is
never clobbered), and the snapshot dump excludes both names so a baked
value can never shadow a later outer harness.
E2E: verified against real huggingface_hub 1.27.0 detect_agent() with a
cached registry — 'hermes-agent' detected via AI_AGENT and via
HERMES_SESSION_ID; old 'hermes' value reproduced the 'unknown' bug.
CLI and gateway entry points now set AI_AGENT=hermes (the emerging
cross-agent standard read by e.g. huggingface_hub agent detection) and
HERMES_AGENT=true, via setdefault so an outer harness is never
clobbered.
User-visible surface from the #82616 session-continuity campaign:
- sessions.md: 'Repair Stranded Gateway Sessions' (evidence rules,
dry-run-first, why adoption is never automatic) and 'Continuity After
Crashes and Restarts' (atomic identity, self-heal, recency resolution,
reset-boundary fence)
- cli-commands.md: repair-routing row in the hermes sessions table
Docs build verified (en + zh-Hans).
New tests/skills/test_authoring_standards.py parametrizes every bundled +
optional SKILL.md (1148 checks) against the mechanically-verifiable subset
of the hardline standards:
- required frontmatter fields (name/description/version/author/license/
platforms) + tags
- frontmatter name == directory name
- description <= 60 chars, ends with period, no marketing words
- related_skills resolve in-repo
- no machine-local paths
- <= 100k chars
Grandfather dict for legacy debt ships EMPTY — all pre-existing violations
fixed in this PR:
- 13 frontmatter names canonicalized to their directory names (the install
identifier); all related_skills references updated (comfyui -> stable-
diffusion). Fixes the class behind PR #42788's report; also fixes
here.now's invalid dot-name.
- optional-skills/devops/cli -> inference-sh-cli (dir was the generic
'cli'; fm name was right) incl. docs pages (en + zh-Hans), catalog row,
sidebar entry.
- pytorch-fsdp: 157k generated 'Quick Reference' dump moved to
references/common-patterns.md; SKILL.md 159k -> 2.5k with a pointer.
- research-paper-writing: 31.7k Phase 5 drafting section moved to
references/phase5-paper-drafting.md; SKILL.md 103k -> 71k.
Docs regenerated with scope discipline.
- description 210 -> 57 chars; author credits Ben Barclay (benbarclay) first
- optional-skills/creative/ (marketing vertical, narrowest audience of
the batch)
- dropped phantom 'image-generation-workflow' ref; visuals via the
image_generate tool
- honest handoff language: platforms without connectors end at approved
drafts marked handed-off, never claimed as published
- tests (10) incl. phantom-ref and honest-handoff guards
- docs regen scoped: per-skill page + one catalog row + one sidebar line
Skill polish:
- description 208 -> 57 chars; author credits Ben Barclay (benbarclay) first
- connector framing (google-workspace, obsidian, notion, email-inbox-triage)
- modern section order; boilerplate folded into step-local rules
Blueprint wiring (completes the batch's recipe integration):
- weekly-review blueprint loads weekly-review-planning; prompt follows the
skill's seven-section shape, drafts-only
- morning-brief blueprint loads google-workspace; prompt points at
references/daily-brief.md when connected
- important-mail blueprint loads email-inbox-triage
- blueprints index regenerated
Tests: 13 skill tests + two catalog invariants (every blueprint skills=
entry resolves to a real bundled skill; the four task blueprints are wired
to their procedure skills). 32 green across both files.
The bundled docx, xlsx, powerpoint, and pdf skills were adapted from
Anthropic's document skills and carried their proprietary LICENSE.txt
(no derivatives, no redistribution). Flagged as critical license
findings by the SkillEvaluator Tier 1 scan of our skill tree.
This replaces all four with clean-room rewrites:
- Authored from scratch against library knowledge only (python-docx,
openpyxl, python-pptx, pypdf/reportlab/pdfplumber — all MIT/BSD) by
isolated subagents given functional specs, with an explicit
prohibition on reading the prior skill content or anthropics/skills;
session transcripts retained as provenance evidence.
- MIT licensed (LICENSE file per skill), author: Nous Research.
- Each skill: SKILL.md to house standards + argparse helper scripts
with UTF-8-explicit I/O + its own e2e pytest suite (fixtures built
on the fly, non-ASCII round-trips run under LC_ALL=C).
- All four pass SkillEvaluator Tier 1 pii+unicode+lint 3/3.
tests/skills/test_office_document_skills.py rewritten against the new
contracts: MIT/no-Anthropic-text invariants, scripts documented in
SKILL.md, argparse CLI shape, and a no-locale-default-open() check
(which caught and fixed a real gap: pdfplumber text reads are fine,
but the invariant scan now guards every future script).
Docs pages regenerated for the four skills (scoped; unrelated
generator drift excluded).
Honest capability deltas vs the old versions are documented per
SKILL.md (e.g. tracked-changes accept/reject and OOXML XSD validation
are not reimplemented; form flattening limits stated).
The published tarball ships lib/binding/napi-9-darwin-unknown-arm64 on every
platform, so a real Windows host has both it and the downloaded win32 binding
— the classify-everything gate threw on the darwin dir and killed every
Windows pack. Stage only bindings naming the target platform (classify still
rejects impostors), stop copyGlobByExt from recursing into lib/binding, and
add a version tripwire so a get-windows bump fails the build until the
lib/windows.js rewrite is re-verified.
Also from review: the renderer answers window.read.respond with empty text
when the IPC invoke rejects (older shell / main-side throw) instead of
stalling the tool's 30s timeout; the tool schema discloses that sibling
Hermes windows are skipped; docs gain read_window_below in both references.
Rewrote from a sibling-skill routing table into a skill that carries its
own procedure, and folded in generalized rules from maintainer practice:
- full-thread reads (gh issue view --comments; newest comment = live state)
- duplicate-PR sweep (issue number + keyword variants) before any code
- design-intent check via git log -p -S alongside premise reproduction
- fix the class: sweep sibling call sites into the same PR
- sabotage run: prove the regression test fails without the fix
- open the PR immediately (PR dispatches CI; CI latency is the long pole)
- close the loop: comment the issue with the PR link
Also: description 205 -> 59 chars, author credits Ben Barclay first,
modern section order, boilerplate trimmed, tests (10) incl. a
router-pattern guard, scoped docs regen.
- description 219 -> 58 chars
- author credits Ben Barclay (benbarclay) first
- modern section order; trimmed template safety boilerplate into
step-local rules and a skill-specific verification checklist
- tests at tests/skills/test_email_inbox_triage_skill.py (9 passing)
- docs regen scoped: per-skill page + one catalog row + one sidebar line
--resume latest resolves the most recent session through the same
workspace-scoped MRU lookup as -c (TUI source first under --tui, with
classic-CLI fallback). --in DIR chdirs before session resolution so the
lookup keys off DIR's workspace, and pins the session there by skipping
the recorded-cwd restore.
Requested by @Jeff9James: hermes --tui --resume latest --in ./dir
Fleet audit showed these task skills are commonly needed across users;
shipping bundled per Teknium's direction. Docs and tests follow the
bundled paths.
Adds a per-server `trust: full|untrusted` config key
(mcp_servers.<name>.trust). On an untrusted server, every write-capable
tool call — any tool whose discovery-time annotations do not carry
readOnlyHint=True — routes through the existing approval surface
(tools.approval.request_elicitation_consent, same lazy-import +
surface-routing pattern the MCP elicitation handler uses) before the RPC
fires. Denied/cancelled/errored approvals fail closed: the RPC never
runs, including the lazy first-use server spawn.
Design points:
- Classification happens at CALL TIME from metadata captured at
DISCOVERY (_record_tool_trust_metadata in _register_server_tools and
the lazy cache-registration path). No toolset/schema mutation, so the
toolset stays byte-stable and prompt caching is preserved.
- readOnlyHint is a server-supplied HINT: on an untrusted server a lying
server can at most skip approval for tools it claims read-only — it
can never widen access. Trust tiering itself is operator config.
- Missing/malformed annotations => write-capable (fail closed).
- Unrecognized trust values => untrusted (fail closed); missing key =>
full (backward compatible, documented in mcp-config-reference).
- The schema cache now persists readOnlyHint so lazy-registered servers
gate identically on next startup without spawning.
Tests: tests/tools/test_mcp_trust_gating.py (11 tests, TDD red->green):
approval invoked + accept proceeds, deny/cancel blocks RPC, readOnlyHint
=true skips gate, trusted/unconfigured servers skip gate, explicit
readOnlyHint=false gated, approval exception fails closed, trust
normalization, discovery-time capture (SDK objects and cached dicts).
Ported from: cloudflare-os classifyTool() (Apache-2.0), corroborated by
Claude Cowork (idea-level).
The six GUI tools moved out of `terminal` into their own toolset; the tables
still described them as check_fn-gated members of it, and as available to every
hermes-* platform bundle.
Per the 'when in doubt, optional' rule — niche prediction-market data
skill that sees no regular use; belongs alongside stocks in the finance
optional category rather than the default bundle.
Install via: hermes skills install official/finance/polymarket
/refine [focus] fires the existing background review fork
(AIAgent._spawn_background_review) immediately instead of waiting for
the automatic 10-turn memory / 10-iteration skill nudge counters.
Optional focus instructions are appended to the review prompt so the
fork prioritizes what the user asked for (e.g. '/refine save the
deploy workflow as a skill').
- New optional focus parameter threaded through
_spawn_background_review -> spawn_background_review_thread.
Automatic post-turn reviews pass None and their prompts are
byte-identical to before.
- CLI handler snapshots conversation_history; gateway handler pulls
the idle session's cached AIAgent from _agent_cache (rejected while
the agent is running).
- Review runs in a daemon thread against the snapshot — live
conversation, message alternation, and prompt cache untouched.
- Slack stays under the 50-slash cap via /hermes refine.
Adapted from the /refine concept in Prime Intellect's Prime-Agent
(Continual Harness); Hermes' equivalent durable state is the
memory + skill stores, so the review fork is the natural target.
/heartbeat every <interval> <prompt> gives the current session one
recurring instruction. When the session is idle and the interval has
elapsed, the prompt is injected as a plain user turn — same
conversation, same context, prompt cache and role alternation
untouched.
- CLI: idle-poll watchdog thread (wake-word watchdog pattern) feeding
_pending_input; gateway: single gateway-wide async poller injecting
through the adapter FIFO. Busy sessions coalesce their tick to the
next idle poll.
- Missed ticks coalesce (anchor resets on fire) — a busy hour yields
ONE heartbeat turn, never a backlog. Real user messages always win.
- 60s interval floor; injected prompt carries a don't-invent-work
guard so idle heartbeats don't generate busywork.
- State persists in SessionDB.state_meta (heartbeat:<session_id>),
survives /resume, migrates across compression session rotations
alongside /goal state.
- Session-scoped and in-process by design — durable cross-process
schedules remain the cron subsystem's job (docs draw the boundary).
- Slack stays under the 50-slash cap via /hermes heartbeat; ghost-text
suggester now prefers the shortest prefix match so /he still
suggests /help.
Adapted from the session-heartbeat concept in Prime Intellect's
Prime-Agent (/heartbeat).
- optional-skills/devops/actual-setup: field-tested setup skill contributed
by shl0ms, updated for the first-class 'actual' provider (the original
targeted a custom-provider config that now collides with the built-in name)
- docs: providers.md section + tables, environment-variables.md, quickstart.md
- tests/skills: frontmatter + first-class-provider conformance checks
* feat(agent): read_preview — the desktop-gated tool that reads the in-app browser
The agent could open the preview pane (open_preview) and read the embedded
terminal (read_terminal), but the browser it had just opened was a black box —
'what does this page say?' had no answer. read_preview mirrors read_terminal
end to end: HERMES_DESKTOP-gated via check_fn (zero schema footprint outside
the GUI), dispatched through the same agent callback pattern, windowed with
start/count so a long page pages instead of flooding context.
* feat(gateway): preview.read blocking bridge
Same lifecycle as terminal.read: the tool blocks on preview.read.request, the
renderer answers preview.read.respond (allow_expired — a slow page extraction
losing the 45s race must not surface a raw 4009), and a timeout emits
preview.read.expire so late answers resolve quietly.
* feat(desktop): the renderer serializes the active preview tab for the agent
preview-reader.ts is the preview analog of the terminal's buffer registry: the
URL pane registers a page reader (webview executeJavaScript → title + visible
innerText) keyed by tab id; readActivePreview resolves the ACTIVE tab, windows
the text (24k cap per read), and answers file/artifact tabs with identity plus
a note pointing at the tool that reads that content directly. The gateway
event handler answers preview.read.request beside terminal.read.request.
- cron: state explicitly that job definitions survive updates, gateway
restarts and reboots (asked directly in #37542)
- mcp: add a Claude Code bridge tip - mcpServers maps to mcp_servers and
hermes import-agent migrates it (the MCP page never says 'mcpServers'
in the client direction; arrivals from Claude Code get no pointer)
- installation: surface loginctl enable-linger in the non-sudo/service
user section where affected users start (currently only on the
gateway page; #43748)
- sessions: document optimize, optimize-storage, repair, recover and
retitle-skills in the CLI reference (shipped in v0.19.1 --help but
absent from the table) and recommend non-destructive optimize before
prune in the db-growth tip
All wording verified against hermes v0.19.1 --help output and the live
pages on 2026-08-04.
The reset keywords have existed in both CLI and gateway handlers since
June but were undocumented — users couldn't find how to cancel a
personality overlay. Adds a 'Resetting to the default' section to the
personality feature page and mentions the reset in the CLI guide,
slash-command reference (both tables), and messaging command table.
The top-level delegate_task description repeated content the model already
receives through parameter descriptions: the concurrency limit (tasks param),
the full nesting clause (role param), context-passing guidance (goal/context
params), and background semantics (background param). Every API call paid for
the duplication (~4,000 chars).
The description now carries only what exists nowhere else in the schema:
use/don't-use routing (execute_code, cronjob), the no-poll rule, the
non-durability warning, the self-report verification contract with concrete
verbs, the language-passing example, the leaf blocked-tool list, and model
inheritance. 3,963 -> 1,704 chars (~570 tokens saved per API call), and the
top-level text is now static (dynamic limits flow only through the two param
descriptions, which are already rebuilt per get_definitions() call).
A/B benchmark across 4 models (gpt-4o, gpt-4o-mini, claude-haiku-4.5,
llama-3.3-70b) showed the naive compaction in PR #72813 regressed weaker
models on exactly the passages it cut (side-effect verification 8/8->0/8 on
gpt-4o-mini; language passing 3/3->0/3 on haiku-4.5). This version keeps
those benchmark-sensitive hooks verbatim.
Tests pin the contracts at keyword level (not prose-literal) plus a size
ceiling, and verify dynamic limits still reach the model via the tasks/role
param descriptions.
Refs #72737, supersedes the delegate_task half of PR #72813.
Answers and written deliverables that rest on retrieved information now get
inline numbered citations plus a mechanically-rendered Sources list, with a
persistent ledger that makes a hallucinated citation detectable.
- skills/research/grounded-citations/scripts/sources.py: stdlib citation
ledger (add/ingest/list/render/verify) at
$HERMES_HOME/cache/citations/ledger.json, profile-aware, O_EXCL-locked so
parallel subagents sharing a ledger can't collide on ids
- SKILL.md: cite-while-drafting procedure, register-at-retrieval rule,
pitfalls, verification gate
- references/citation-formats.md: per-target placement (markdown, LaTeX/PDF,
docx, pptx, xlsx, wiki, BibTeX handoff to research-paper-writing)
- references/grounding-rationale.md: why numbered ids (ALCE 2305.14627,
WebGPT 2112.09332, Perplexity marker conventions), and how this relates to
the in-process registry in PR #44833
- tests/skills/test_grounded_citations_skill.py: 30 tests
Brooklyn Nicholson
Teknium
Hermes Agent
Jakub Wolniewicz
Nikita Barkov
texasich
witcheer