emozilla
e5f19af2a5
Adds an opt-in stage protocol that lets programmatic drivers (the
desktop GUI's onboarding wizard, CI, future install.sh parity) drive
install.ps1 one step at a time with structured JSON results. Default
invocation (`irm | iex` one-liner) behaves unchanged.
Entry points:
install.ps1 Today's interactive install (unchanged)
install.ps1 -ProtocolVersion Emit protocol version integer
install.ps1 -Manifest Emit JSON manifest of available stages
install.ps1 -Stage <name> Run one stage, emit JSON result
install.ps1 -NonInteractive Suppress Read-Host prompts (skips the
setup wizard and gateway autostart)
install.ps1 -Json Machine-readable completion frame
Manifest exposes 14 stages across prereqs/install/finalize/post-install
categories, with 2 (configure, gateway) flagged needs_user_input=true
so GUI drivers can skip them and handle the equivalent UX themselves.
Along the way, clean-VM testing on stock Windows 10/11 surfaced a
series of latent install.ps1 bugs that were never exercised by
developer machines. Fixed in the same commit:
* Encoding: file is now pure ASCII with no BOM. Windows PowerShell
5.1 reads BOM-less files as Windows-1252 and chokes on em-dashes
(and other UTF-8 sequences), while iex chokes on a leading U+FEFF.
Pure-ASCII satisfies both invocation paths.
* EAP=Stop + native `2>&1` captures: PowerShell wraps stderr lines
from native commands as ErrorRecord objects under EAP=Stop and
throws even when the command exits 0. Relaxed to EAP=Continue
around the astral.sh uv installer, `uv python install`, `npm
install`, `npx playwright install`, the venv import probes, and
the Node winget fallback. Check $LASTEXITCODE for the real signal.
* Cross-process state: each `-Stage <name>` invocation spawns a
fresh powershell child. $script:UvCmd set by Stage-Uv was invisible
to Stage-Python; PATH updated by Stage-Git/Stage-Node was invisible
to subsequent stages spawned by the driver shell. Added Resolve-UvCmd
helper called at the top of every stage that needs uv, and a
Sync-EnvPath helper called at the top of Invoke-Stage to refresh
PATH from the registry.
* UAC avoidance: `winget install OpenJS.NodeJS.LTS` triggers a UAC
prompt that often appears minimized in the taskbar -- looks like a
hang. Switched Test-Node to prefer the official portable Node zip
dropped into %LOCALAPPDATA%\hermes\node\ (mirrors the PortableGit
pattern Install-Git already uses). winget kept as fallback.
* npx hangs on confirmation: `npx playwright install chromium` blocks
on stdin waiting for "Need to install playwright@X.Y.Z (y/N)" when
playwright isn't in local node_modules. Tee-Object pipelines
disconnect stdin from the user's TTY so the install hangs forever.
Pass `--yes` to auto-accept.
* Silent long-running installs: `*> $logPath` redirected every stream
to disk and left the user staring at a frozen "Installing..." line
for the 5-10 minutes Playwright Chromium takes to download. Switched
to `2>&1 | ForEach-Object { "$_" } | Tee-Object -FilePath $log` so
output streams live to the console AND captures to log for failure
diagnostics. ForEach-Object coercion strips PowerShell's red
NativeCommandError formatter from stderr items.
* Console encoding: forced [Console]::OutputEncoding to UTF-8 so
playwright/git/npm progress bars, box-drawing, and check marks render
correctly instead of as IBM437/Windows-1252 mojibake.
* Performance: set $ProgressPreference = "SilentlyContinue" so
Invoke-WebRequest doesn't paint its per-chunk progress bar. The
PS 5.1 progress UI throttles downloads by 10-100x (a 57MB PortableGit
grab takes 5 minutes with the bar on vs ~20 seconds with it off,
same network). Affects PortableGit, Node portable zip, and the
Hermes repo zip fallback.
Tests: scripts/tests/test-install-ps1-stage-protocol.ps1 provides 19
metadata-only assertions covering -ProtocolVersion, -Manifest schema,
and unknown -Stage error frame. No install side effects.
End-to-end validated on a clean Windows 10 VM via:
1. `irm <branch>/scripts/install.ps1 | iex` (canonical CLI path)
2. `powershell -File install.ps1 -Stage X` iterated through every
stage (GUI driver path, exercises cross-process fixes)
Hermes Agent ☤
The self-improving AI agent built by Nous Research. It's the only agent with a built-in learning loop — it creates skills from experience, improves them during use, nudges itself to persist knowledge, searches its own past conversations, and builds a deepening model of who you are across sessions. Run it on a $5 VPS, a GPU cluster, or serverless infrastructure that costs nearly nothing when idle. It's not tied to your laptop — talk to it from Telegram while it works on a cloud VM.
Use any model you want — Nous Portal, OpenRouter (200+ models), NovitaAI (AI-native cloud for Model API, Agent Sandbox, and GPU Cloud), NVIDIA NIM (Nemotron), Xiaomi MiMo, z.ai/GLM, Kimi/Moonshot, MiniMax, Hugging Face, OpenAI, or your own endpoint. Switch with hermes model — no code changes, no lock-in.
| A real terminal interface | Full TUI with multiline editing, slash-command autocomplete, conversation history, interrupt-and-redirect, and streaming tool output. |
| Lives where you do | Telegram, Discord, Slack, WhatsApp, Signal, and CLI — all from a single gateway process. Voice memo transcription, cross-platform conversation continuity. |
| A closed learning loop | Agent-curated memory with periodic nudges. Autonomous skill creation after complex tasks. Skills self-improve during use. FTS5 session search with LLM summarization for cross-session recall. Honcho dialectic user modeling. Compatible with the agentskills.io open standard. |
| Scheduled automations | Built-in cron scheduler with delivery to any platform. Daily reports, nightly backups, weekly audits — all in natural language, running unattended. |
| Delegates and parallelizes | Spawn isolated subagents for parallel workstreams. Write Python scripts that call tools via RPC, collapsing multi-step pipelines into zero-context-cost turns. |
| Runs anywhere, not just your laptop | Seven terminal backends — local, Docker, SSH, Singularity, Modal, Daytona, and Vercel Sandbox. Daytona and Modal offer serverless persistence — your agent's environment hibernates when idle and wakes on demand, costing nearly nothing between sessions. Run it on a $5 VPS or a GPU cluster. |
| Research-ready | Batch trajectory generation, trajectory compression for training the next generation of tool-calling models. |
Quick Install
Linux, macOS, WSL2, Termux
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/NousResearch/hermes-agent/main/scripts/install.sh | bash
Windows (native, PowerShell) — Early Beta
Heads up: Native Windows support is early beta. It installs and runs, but hasn't been road-tested as broadly as our Linux/macOS/WSL2 paths. Please file issues when you hit rough edges. For the most battle-tested Windows setup today, run the Linux/macOS one-liner above inside WSL2.
Run this in PowerShell:
irm https://raw.githubusercontent.com/NousResearch/hermes-agent/main/scripts/install.ps1 | iex
The installer handles everything: uv, Python 3.11, Node.js, ripgrep, ffmpeg, and a portable Git Bash (MinGit, unpacked to %LOCALAPPDATA%\hermes\git — no admin required, completely isolated from any system Git install). Hermes uses this bundled Git Bash to run shell commands.
If you already have Git installed, the installer detects it and uses that instead. Otherwise a ~45MB MinGit download is all you need — it won't touch or interfere with any system Git.
Android / Termux: The tested manual path is documented in the Termux guide. On Termux, Hermes installs a curated
.[termux]extra because the full.[all]extra currently pulls Android-incompatible voice dependencies.Windows: Native Windows is supported as an early beta — the PowerShell one-liner above installs everything, but expect rough edges and please file issues when you hit them. If you'd rather use WSL2 (our most battle-tested Windows path), the Linux command works there too. Native Windows install lives under
%LOCALAPPDATA%\hermes; WSL2 installs under~/.hermesas on Linux. The only Hermes feature that currently needs WSL2 specifically is the browser-based dashboard chat pane (it uses a POSIX PTY — classic CLI and gateway both run natively).
After installation:
source ~/.bashrc # reload shell (or: source ~/.zshrc)
hermes # start chatting!
Getting Started
hermes # Interactive CLI — start a conversation
hermes model # Choose your LLM provider and model
hermes tools # Configure which tools are enabled
hermes config set # Set individual config values
hermes gateway # Start the messaging gateway (Telegram, Discord, etc.)
hermes setup # Run the full setup wizard (configures everything at once)
hermes claw migrate # Migrate from OpenClaw (if coming from OpenClaw)
hermes update # Update to the latest version
hermes doctor # Diagnose any issues
CLI vs Messaging Quick Reference
Hermes has two entry points: start the terminal UI with hermes, or run the gateway and talk to it from Telegram, Discord, Slack, WhatsApp, Signal, or Email. Once you're in a conversation, many slash commands are shared across both interfaces.
| Action | CLI | Messaging platforms |
|---|---|---|
| Start chatting | hermes |
Run hermes gateway setup + hermes gateway start, then send the bot a message |
| Start fresh conversation | /new or /reset |
/new or /reset |
| Change model | /model [provider:model] |
/model [provider:model] |
| Set a personality | /personality [name] |
/personality [name] |
| Retry or undo the last turn | /retry, /undo |
/retry, /undo |
| Compress context / check usage | /compress, /usage, /insights [--days N] |
/compress, /usage, /insights [days] |
| Browse skills | /skills or /<skill-name> |
/<skill-name> |
| Interrupt current work | Ctrl+C or send a new message |
/stop or send a new message |
| Platform-specific status | /platforms |
/status, /sethome |
For the full command lists, see the CLI guide and the Messaging Gateway guide.
Documentation
All documentation lives at hermes-agent.nousresearch.com/docs:
| Section | What's Covered |
|---|---|
| Quickstart | Install → setup → first conversation in 2 minutes |
| CLI Usage | Commands, keybindings, personalities, sessions |
| Configuration | Config file, providers, models, all options |
| Messaging Gateway | Telegram, Discord, Slack, WhatsApp, Signal, Home Assistant |
| Security | Command approval, DM pairing, container isolation |
| Tools & Toolsets | 40+ tools, toolset system, terminal backends |
| Skills System | Procedural memory, Skills Hub, creating skills |
| Memory | Persistent memory, user profiles, best practices |
| MCP Integration | Connect any MCP server for extended capabilities |
| Cron Scheduling | Scheduled tasks with platform delivery |
| Context Files | Project context that shapes every conversation |
| Architecture | Project structure, agent loop, key classes |
| Contributing | Development setup, PR process, code style |
| CLI Reference | All commands and flags |
| Environment Variables | Complete env var reference |
Migrating from OpenClaw
If you're coming from OpenClaw, Hermes can automatically import your settings, memories, skills, and API keys.
During first-time setup: The setup wizard (hermes setup) automatically detects ~/.openclaw and offers to migrate before configuration begins.
Anytime after install:
hermes claw migrate # Interactive migration (full preset)
hermes claw migrate --dry-run # Preview what would be migrated
hermes claw migrate --preset user-data # Migrate without secrets
hermes claw migrate --overwrite # Overwrite existing conflicts
What gets imported:
- SOUL.md — persona file
- Memories — MEMORY.md and USER.md entries
- Skills — user-created skills →
~/.hermes/skills/openclaw-imports/ - Command allowlist — approval patterns
- Messaging settings — platform configs, allowed users, working directory
- API keys — allowlisted secrets (Telegram, OpenRouter, OpenAI, Anthropic, ElevenLabs)
- TTS assets — workspace audio files
- Workspace instructions — AGENTS.md (with
--workspace-target)
See hermes claw migrate --help for all options, or use the openclaw-migration skill for an interactive agent-guided migration with dry-run previews.
Contributing
We welcome contributions! See the Contributing Guide for development setup, code style, and PR process.
Quick start for contributors — clone and go with setup-hermes.sh:
git clone https://github.com/NousResearch/hermes-agent.git
cd hermes-agent
./setup-hermes.sh # installs uv, creates venv, installs .[all], symlinks ~/.local/bin/hermes
./hermes # auto-detects the venv, no need to `source` first
Manual path (equivalent to the above):
curl -LsSf https://astral.sh/uv/install.sh | sh
uv venv .venv --python 3.11
source .venv/bin/activate
uv pip install -e ".[all,dev]"
scripts/run_tests.sh
Community
- 💬 Discord
- 📚 Skills Hub
- 🐛 Issues
- 🔌 computer-use-linux — Linux desktop-control MCP server for Hermes and other MCP hosts, with AT-SPI accessibility trees, Wayland/X11 input, screenshots, and compositor window targeting.
- 🔌 HermesClaw — Community WeChat bridge: Run Hermes Agent and OpenClaw on the same WeChat account.
License
MIT — see LICENSE.
Built by Nous Research.