When using Modal, Docker, SSH, or Singularity as the terminal backend
from the CLI, the agent resolved cwd: "." to the host machine's local
path (e.g. /Users/rewbs/code/hermes-agent) and passed it to the remote
sandbox, where it doesn't exist. All commands failed with "No such file
or directory".
Root cause: cli.py unconditionally resolved "." to os.getcwd() and wrote
it to TERMINAL_CWD regardless of backend type. Every tool then used that
host-local path as the working directory inside the remote environment.
Fixes:
- cli.py: only resolve "." to os.getcwd() for the local backend. For all
remote backends (ssh, docker, modal, singularity), leave TERMINAL_CWD
unset so the tool layer uses per-backend defaults (/root, /, ~, etc.)
- terminal_tool.py: added sanity check -- if TERMINAL_CWD contains a
host-local prefix (/Users/, /home/, C:\) for a non-local backend, log
a warning and fall back to the backend's default
- terminal_tool.py: SSH default CWD is now ~ instead of os.getcwd()
- file_operations.py: last-resort CWD fallback changed from os.getcwd()
to "/" so host paths never leak into remote file operations
Two config systems used different key names for the terminal backend:
- hermes_cli/config.py, README, and all docs use "terminal.backend"
- cli.py's env var mapping only recognized "terminal.env_type"
Users following the docs who set `backend: modal` in ~/.hermes/config.yaml
had it silently ignored -- TERMINAL_ENV always defaulted to "local".
Additionally, when no config file existed, cli.py's hardcoded defaults
overwrote any TERMINAL_ENV=modal set in .env, despite the comment saying
"env vars take precedence."
Fixes:
- cli.py now normalizes "backend" -> "env_type" (backend takes precedence)
- Defaults no longer overwrite .env when no config file terminal section exists
- hermes status reads from config as fallback when env var isn't set
Also fixes four related bugs found in the Modal/sandbox lifecycle:
- file_tools cache not cleared on sandbox cleanup (stale ops on dead sandbox)
- Global lock held during slow Modal teardown (blocked all tool calls 10-15s)
- Race condition in file_tools between existence check and access (KeyError)
- Per-task creation locks never cleaned up (memory leak)
- Improved the caching mechanism for ShellFileOperations to ensure stale entries are invalidated when environments are cleaned up.
- Enhanced thread safety by refining the use of locks during environment creation and cleanup processes.
- Streamlined the cleanup of inactive environments to prevent blocking other tool calls, ensuring efficient resource management.
- Added error handling and messaging improvements for better user feedback during environment cleanup.
- Introduced a new cleanup function that ensures terminal and browser sessions are cleaned up only once during application exit.
- Updated atexit registration to use the new cleanup function, enhancing resource management and preventing potential issues from multiple cleanup calls.
- Modified terminal cleanup messaging to only display when environments are cleaned, improving user feedback.
- Removed the check for the browserbase SDK from the optional packages list.
- Added validation for Node.js installation and the presence of the agent-browser package, providing feedback on their status for browser automation tools.
- Updated the doctor script to load environment variables from user-specific and project-specific `.env` files, improving configuration management.
- Added checks for the existence of the `SOUL.md` persona file, providing feedback on its status and creating it with a template if missing.
- Enhanced install scripts to create the `SOUL.md` file if it doesn't exist, ensuring users can easily customize the agent's personality.
- Modified the retrieval of tool definitions to use the agent result's "tools" key, ensuring accurate logging in the transcript.
- Enhanced the response structure to include tools in the final output, improving the clarity of tool usage in session interactions.
- Refactored the agent response processing to return a comprehensive result dictionary, including final responses and full message history.
- Improved transcript logging to capture the complete conversation, including tool calls and intermediate reasoning, facilitating session resumption and debugging.
- Added handling for fresh sessions to include tool definitions in the transcript for clarity.
- Implemented logic to filter and timestamp new messages, ensuring accurate logging of user and assistant interactions.
- Implemented deep copy of DEFAULT_CONFIG to prevent mutations during config loading.
- Enhanced user config merging process to clarify the deep merge of user values over defaults.
- Added newline handling when appending environment variables to ensure proper formatting.
- Updated the set_config_value function to write only user-specific configurations back to the file, avoiding overwriting default values.
- Updated prompts for the OPENAI_BASE_URL to clarify its use for custom endpoints.
- Enhanced the migration function to skip "advanced" environment variables during interactive configuration, streamlining the setup for standard users.
- Improved messaging for missing optional API keys, ensuring clearer guidance for users during configuration.
- Revised descriptions and prompts for the OPENAI_BASE_URL and OPENAI_API_KEY environment variables to enhance user understanding.
- Added a URL reference for the OPENAI_API_KEY to guide users in obtaining their API key.
- Specified the use of the API key for voice transcription and custom endpoints, improving the overall configuration documentation.
- Updated the vision tool to accept both HTTP/HTTPS URLs and local file paths for image analysis.
- Implemented caching of user-uploaded images in local directories to ensure reliable access for the vision tool, addressing issues with ephemeral URLs.
- Enhanced platform adapters (Discord, Telegram, WhatsApp) to download and cache images, allowing for immediate analysis and enriched message context.
- Added a new method to auto-analyze images attached by users, enriching the conversation with detailed descriptions.
- Improved documentation for image handling processes and updated related functions for clarity and efficiency.
- Clarified the requirements for Telegram voice bubbles, specifying the need for ffmpeg when using Edge TTS.
- Enhanced README and messaging documentation to detail audio delivery formats across platforms.
- Improved installation script messages to inform users about the necessity of ffmpeg for proper audio playback on Telegram.
- Added detection of the platform from the environment variable to determine the appropriate audio output format.
- Implemented logic to output Opus (.ogg) files for Telegram when using compatible TTS providers, while defaulting to MP3 for others.
- Updated `pyproject.toml` to include Edge TTS and ElevenLabs as dependencies.
- Enhanced documentation to detail voice message capabilities across platforms and TTS provider options.
- Modified the GatewayRunner to handle MEDIA tags from TTS tool responses, ensuring proper delivery of audio messages.
- Introduced a default agent identity prompt to ensure consistent behavior across platforms.
- Added platform-specific formatting hints for CLI, WhatsApp, Telegram, and Discord to guide the agent's output style.
- Updated the AIAgent initialization to accept a platform parameter, enhancing adaptability to different interfaces.
- Appended the current local date and time to the active system prompt to provide context for the model, addressing potential misinterpretations due to training cutoffs.
- Introduced a new script, `kill_modal.sh`, to facilitate stopping running Modal apps, including the ability to stop all apps or specific swe-rex sandboxes.
- Enhanced user experience with clear usage instructions and feedback during the stopping process.
- Improved error handling to ensure smooth execution even if some apps fail to stop.
- Updated task filter descriptions for clarity and added a new skip task feature to exclude incompatible tasks.
- Introduced a set of modal incompatible tasks to prevent execution errors in cloud environments.
- Implemented streaming JSONL logging for task results, preserving data even on interruptions.
- Refactored task evaluation logic to include skipped task reporting and improved error handling.
- Included "image_generate" in the toolsets for web, vision, and skills categories, expanding functionality for image-related tasks.
- Updated comments for clarity on the new tool's purpose, ensuring users understand its integration within the existing framework.
- Updated the image generation function description to clarify usage with markdown.
- Added `send_image` method to `BasePlatformAdapter` for native image sending across platforms.
- Implemented `send_image` in `DiscordAdapter` and `TelegramAdapter` to handle image attachments directly.
- Introduced `extract_images` method to extract image URLs from markdown and HTML, improving content processing.
- Enhanced message handling to support sending images as attachments while maintaining text content.
- Revised the description to reflect full access capabilities, including terminal usage with a dangerous command approval system.
- Added terminal and file manipulation tools to the toolset, enhancing functionality for users.
- Updated comments for clarity on tool purposes, ensuring better understanding of available features.
- Revised the labeled shape and arrow sections to utilize container binding instead of the deprecated "label" property, ensuring proper text rendering.
- Added warnings about the invalidity of the "label" property and emphasized the use of `boundElements` for text elements.
- Updated examples in dark-mode and general references to reflect the new binding approach, enhancing clarity and usability for users creating diagrams.
- Removed the skills_categories tool from the skills toolset, streamlining the skills functionality to focus on skills_list and skill_view.
- Updated the system prompt to dynamically build a compact skills index, allowing the model to quickly reference available skills without additional tool calls.
- Cleaned up related code and documentation to reflect the removal of skills_categories, ensuring clarity and consistency across the codebase.
- Introduced a new DESCRIPTION.md file outlining diagram creation skills for visual diagrams and flowcharts using Excalidraw.
- Added SKILL.md for the Excalidraw skill, detailing its functionality, usage, and workflow for creating hand-drawn style diagrams.
- Created references for color palettes, dark mode diagrams, and example diagrams to assist users in utilizing the Excalidraw skill effectively.
- Implemented an upload script for sharing diagrams via Excalidraw.com, ensuring user-friendly access to generated diagrams.
- Added functionality to signal and terminate long-running terminal commands when a new user message is received, allowing for immediate agent response.
- Introduced a global interrupt event in the terminal tool to facilitate early termination of subprocesses.
- Updated the AIAgent class to handle interrupts gracefully, ensuring that remaining tool calls are skipped and appropriate messages are returned to maintain valid message sequences.
- Enhanced the conversion of message history to agent format by distinguishing between normal and rich agent messages.
- Implemented logic to preserve full message structure for tool-related messages, ensuring valid assistant-to-tool sequences.
- Simplified handling of simple text messages by stripping unnecessary fields while retaining essential role and content information.
- Added logic to clear the adapter's interrupt event to prevent infinite loops during message processing.
- Updated the get_pending_message method to pop messages from the pending queue, ensuring proper message handling.
- Updated the start_gateway function to return a boolean indicating success or failure, allowing for better control over exit codes.
- Modified the main function to handle gateway startup failures, ensuring systemd can automatically restart on transient errors.
- Enhanced error handling in the hermes_cli gateway to exit with code 1 if the gateway fails to connect to any platform.
- Added /retry command to resend the last user message, improving user experience by allowing message re-sending without retyping.
- Introduced /undo command to remove the last user/assistant exchange from conversation history, providing better control over conversation flow.
- Updated save_config_value function to respect user and project config precedence, enhancing configuration management.
- Improved prompt handling and visual output for user input, adapting to terminal width for better readability.
- Implemented a cleanup process to terminate any remaining sandboxes after evaluation, addressing issues with orphaned thread pool workers.
- Enhanced logging to inform users about the cleanup process, ensuring better resource management and user awareness.
- Added a new `_atexit_cleanup` function to handle cleanup of active environments and stop the cleanup thread upon program exit.
- Enhanced logging to inform users about the number of remaining sandboxes being shut down during cleanup.
- Added task_timeout parameter to enforce a maximum wall-clock time for each task, automatically scoring as FAIL if exceeded.
- Introduced terminal_timeout and tool_pool_size parameters to improve command execution and concurrency management.
- Updated logging to provide detailed task execution times and timeout handling, enhancing overall monitoring.
- Removed outdated evaluate_config.yaml file to streamline configuration management.
- Introduced terminal_timeout and terminal_lifetime parameters to control command execution and sandbox inactivity.
- Updated environment variable handling to allow configuration overrides for terminal settings.
- Enhanced logging to provide detailed information about terminal settings during initialization.
- Added tool_pool_size parameter to dynamically resize the thread pool for tool execution, improving concurrency management.
- Increased thread pool size for tool execution from 8 to 128 to improve concurrency and prevent starvation.
- Added a function to resize the tool executor dynamically based on configuration.
- Enhanced logging to track API call durations and tool execution times, including warnings for slow tools.
- Improved overall performance monitoring by logging detailed information for each turn in the agent loop.
- Increased max_token_length from 16000 to 32000 to allow for longer inputs.
- Adjusted agent_temperature from 0.6 to 0.8 for more varied responses.
- Extended test_timeout from 180 to 600 seconds to accommodate longer evaluations.
- Updated data directory path for saving evaluations to ensure proper organization.
- Introduced new environments: Terminal Test Environment and SWE Environment, each with default configurations for testing and software engineering tasks.
- Added TerminalBench 2.0 evaluation environment with comprehensive setup for agentic LLMs, including task execution and verification.
- Enhanced ToolContext with methods for uploading and downloading files, ensuring binary-safe operations.
- Updated documentation across environments to reflect new features and usage instructions.
- Refactored existing environment configurations for consistency and clarity.
- Updated the _SingularityEnvironment class to utilize a persistent Apptainer instance, allowing state (files, installs, environment changes) to persist across commands.
- Enhanced the initialization process to start a background instance with full isolation and writable filesystem.
- Modified the execute method to connect to the running instance, ensuring commands run within the same container context.
- Implemented cleanup functionality to stop the persistent instance on cleanup or destruction, improving resource management.
- Updated class documentation to reflect new features and usage of the persistent environment.
- Introduced a caching strategy that reduces input token costs by ~75% on multi-turn conversations by caching the conversation prefix.
- Added functions to apply cache control markers to messages, enhancing efficiency in token usage.
- Updated AIAgent to auto-enable prompt caching for Claude models, with configurable cache TTL.
- Enhanced logging to track cache hit statistics when caching is active, improving monitoring of token usage.
- Added checks for local installation of the agent-browser CLI in the `_find_agent_browser` function, improving installation guidance.
- Implemented per-task socket directory management in `_run_browser_command` to prevent concurrency issues.
- Updated `cleanup_browser` to remove per-task socket directories, ensuring proper resource cleanup after task completion.
- Refactored comments for clarity and improved documentation throughout the browser tool code.
- Added imports for resource cleanup during safe shutdown, including terminal and browser session cleanup.
- Refactored command handling to preserve original case for model names and prompt text, improving user experience.
- Introduced a dedicated interrupt queue to manage user input while the agent is running, preventing race conditions.
- Updated comments and documentation for clarity on command processing and input handling.
- Changed the default LLM model in the setup wizard and example environment file to 'anthropic/claude-opus-4.6'.
- Updated terminal working directory settings in CLI and related files to use the current directory ('.') instead of '/tmp'.
- Enhanced documentation comments for clarity on terminal configuration and working directory behavior.
