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Hermes Agent: The Complete Developer Guide

by Marudi

other
Pages125
Formatmarkdown
ListedJune 8, 2026
UpdatedJune 14, 2026
Subscribers3

About

A practical, code-first developer guide to Hermes Agent, an open-source autonomous AI agent framework built by Nous Research. Covers installation, tool usage, memory systems, skills creation, structured output, delegation patterns, multi-platform deployment, and production best practices.

125Chapters
331Topics
125Pages

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Hermes Agent: The Complete Developer Guide

Author: Marudi Version: 1.0 — June 2026 Last updated: 2026-06-14 — current to Hermes Agent v2026.6.5 and model Hermes-4.3-36B.

Load this book when:

  • Installing, configuring, or upgrading Hermes Agent (the Nous Research autonomous agent framework).
  • Writing a custom plugin, skill, or MCP integration for Hermes.
  • Deploying Hermes as a messaging gateway, Docker/VPS service, or serverless backend.
  • Building delegation hierarchies, agent swarms, or the self-evolution loop.
  • Choosing or prompting a Hermes open-weight model (Hermes-2/3/4/4.3) directly via API or Ollama.
  • Debugging tool-calling, ChatML formatting, structured output, context compression, or command-approval behavior.

Not in scope: training/fine-tuning Hermes models from scratch; non-Hermes agent frameworks.

Audience: Public marketplace reference. Maintainer / custodian: Marudi.

Scope of validity: Hermes Agent release scheme is date-based; this edition is current as of Hermes Agent v2026.6.5 (June 6, 2026) and Hermes 4.3-36B (the latest model, December 2025). Refresh cadence: review every 4–6 weeks — the framework ships multiple releases per month. (Note: releases carry both a date-based version (primary, e.g. v2026.6.5) and a semver alias (e.g. v0.16.0); secondary sources sometimes cite only the semver. Both refer to the same artifact. Source: https://github.com/NousResearch/hermes-agent/releases/tag/v2026.6.5)

Preface

Most AI agents are sophisticated command-line tools. You give them a task, they complete it, and you start fresh next session. Hermes is different.

Hermes Agent — built by Nous Research — is an agent that grows over time. Every complex task it completes can become a reusable skill. Every fact it discovers gets stored in persistent memory. Every session deepens its model of who you are and how you work. The longer it runs, the more capable it becomes — not because the underlying model changes, but because the agent accumulates structured, reusable knowledge around it.

This book is a practical, code-first developer guide. It covers everything from installing Hermes and making your first tool call, to writing custom plugins, deploying multi-platform gateways, building delegation hierarchies, and running the self-evolution loop. Every code sample is production-ready.

You'll find the same format throughout: working code, concise explanations, and reference tables you'll reach for again and again.

Part I — Understanding Hermes

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Table of Contents

Chapter 2 — Decision Matrix

Linux / macOS / WSL2 / Android (Termux)

Install Ollama
Pull a model (Hermes models are recommended for best tool-calling)

Turn 1: Model calls web_search
Turn 2: Model calls web_extract on the top result
Turn 3: Model writes the summary

Single task

One-shot background process
Interactive session via tmux (for long-running tasks)
Check progress

Step 1: Collect data mechanically
Scrape 100 product pages...

Via CLI
Via in-session slash command

~/.hermes/plugins/slack-notifier/__init__.py

Stdio (local process)
HTTP remote server

Install Ollama
Pull best local agent model
GPU acceleration (NVIDIA)
CPU-only
Verify
Select: Custom endpoint
URL: http://localhost:11434/v1
Model: nous-hermes3:8b-llama3.1-q4_K_M

─── Model & Provider ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── Terminal Backend ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── Security / Approvals ─────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── Memory ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── Context Compression ──────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── Agent Behavior ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── Display & UI ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── TTS ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── Voice Mode ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── Web Search ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── Browser Automation ───────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── Image Generation ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── Skills ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── Plugins ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── Delegation ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── MCP Servers ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── Custom Providers ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── Fallback Providers ───────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── AWS Bedrock ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

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Full migration (interactive)
Full migration, non-interactive

Appendix A: Quick Start Cheat Sheet
Install
Start
First steps
Daily use
Add capabilities
Deploy gateway
Appendix B: Tool Call Template
─── Tool definitions ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── Tool implementations ──────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── System prompt ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── Parser ────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
─── Agent loop ────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
Check for tool calls
Execute all tool calls
─── Usage ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
Appendix C: Environment Variables Reference
Core
API keys (in ~/.hermes/.env, chmod 600)
Tool gateway
Memory integrations
Gateway auth
Terminal backends
Kanban board
OpenClaw migration
Ollama

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