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Tools Runtime

Hermes tools are self-registering functions grouped into toolsets and executed through a central registry/dispatch system.

Primary files:

  • tools/registry.py
  • model_tools.py
  • toolsets.py
  • tools/terminal_tool.py
  • tools/environments/*

Tool registration model

Each tool module calls registry.register(...) at import time.

model_tools.py is responsible for importing/discovering tool modules and building the schema list used by the model.

How registry.register() works

Every tool file in tools/ calls registry.register() at module level to declare itself. The function signature is:

registry.register(
name="terminal", # Unique tool name (used in API schemas)
toolset="terminal", # Toolset this tool belongs to
schema={...}, # OpenAI function-calling schema (description, parameters)
handler=handle_terminal, # The function that executes when the tool is called
check_fn=check_terminal, # Optional: returns True/False for availability
requires_env=["SOME_VAR"], # Optional: env vars needed (for UI display)
is_async=False, # Whether the handler is an async coroutine
description="Run commands", # Human-readable description
emoji="💻", # Emoji for spinner/progress display
)

Each call creates a ToolEntry stored in the singleton ToolRegistry._tools dict keyed by tool name. If a name collision occurs across toolsets, a warning is logged and the later registration wins.

Discovery: _discover_tools()

When model_tools.py is imported, it calls _discover_tools() which imports every tool module in order:

_modules = [
"tools.web_tools",
"tools.terminal_tool",
"tools.file_tools",
"tools.vision_tools",
"tools.mixture_of_agents_tool",
"tools.image_generation_tool",
"tools.skills_tool",
"tools.skill_manager_tool",
"tools.browser_tool",
"tools.cronjob_tools",
"tools.rl_training_tool",
"tools.tts_tool",
"tools.todo_tool",
"tools.memory_tool",
"tools.session_search_tool",
"tools.clarify_tool",
"tools.code_execution_tool",
"tools.delegate_tool",
"tools.process_registry",
"tools.send_message_tool",
# "tools.honcho_tools", # Removed — Honcho is now a memory provider plugin
"tools.homeassistant_tool",
]

Each import triggers the module's registry.register() calls. Errors in optional tools (e.g., missing fal_client for image generation) are caught and logged — they don't prevent other tools from loading.

After core tool discovery, MCP tools and plugin tools are also discovered:

  1. MCP toolstools.mcp_tool.discover_mcp_tools() reads MCP server config and registers tools from external servers.
  2. Plugin toolshermes_cli.plugins.discover_plugins() loads user/project/pip plugins that may register additional tools.

Tool availability checking (check_fn)

Each tool can optionally provide a check_fn — a callable that returns True when the tool is available and False otherwise. Typical checks include:

  • API key present — e.g., lambda: bool(os.environ.get("SERP_API_KEY")) for web search
  • Service running — e.g., checking if the Honcho server is configured
  • Binary installed — e.g., verifying playwright is available for browser tools

When registry.get_definitions() builds the schema list for the model, it runs each tool's check_fn():

# Simplified from registry.py
if entry.check_fn:
try:
available = bool(entry.check_fn())
except Exception:
available = False # Exceptions = unavailable
if not available:
continue # Skip this tool entirely

Key behaviors:

  • Check results are cached per-call — if multiple tools share the same check_fn, it only runs once.
  • Exceptions in check_fn() are treated as "unavailable" (fail-safe).
  • The is_toolset_available() method checks whether a toolset's check_fn passes, used for UI display and toolset resolution.

Toolset resolution

Toolsets are named bundles of tools. Hermes resolves them through:

  • explicit enabled/disabled toolset lists
  • platform presets (hermes-cli, hermes-telegram, etc.)
  • dynamic MCP toolsets
  • curated special-purpose sets like hermes-acp

How get_tool_definitions() filters tools

The main entry point is model_tools.get_tool_definitions(enabled_toolsets, disabled_toolsets, quiet_mode):

  1. If enabled_toolsets is provided — only tools from those toolsets are included. Each toolset name is resolved via resolve_toolset() which expands composite toolsets into individual tool names.

  2. If disabled_toolsets is provided — start with ALL toolsets, then subtract the disabled ones.

  3. If neither — include all known toolsets.

  4. Registry filtering — the resolved tool name set is passed to registry.get_definitions(), which applies check_fn filtering and returns OpenAI-format schemas.

  5. Dynamic schema patching — after filtering, execute_code and browser_navigate schemas are dynamically adjusted to only reference tools that actually passed filtering (prevents model hallucination of unavailable tools).

Legacy toolset names

Old toolset names with _tools suffixes (e.g., web_tools, terminal_tools) are mapped to their modern tool names via _LEGACY_TOOLSET_MAP for backward compatibility.

Dispatch

At runtime, tools are dispatched through the central registry, with agent-loop exceptions for some agent-level tools such as memory/todo/session-search handling.

Dispatch flow: model tool_call → handler execution

When the model returns a tool_call, the flow is:

Model response with tool_call

run_agent.py agent loop

model_tools.handle_function_call(name, args, task_id, user_task)

[Agent-loop tools?] → handled directly by agent loop (todo, memory, session_search, delegate_task)

[Plugin pre-hook] → invoke_hook("pre_tool_call", ...)

registry.dispatch(name, args, **kwargs)

Look up ToolEntry by name

[Async handler?] → bridge via _run_async()
[Sync handler?] → call directly

Return result string (or JSON error)

[Plugin post-hook] → invoke_hook("post_tool_call", ...)

Error wrapping

All tool execution is wrapped in error handling at two levels:

  1. registry.dispatch() — catches any exception from the handler and returns {"error": "Tool execution failed: ExceptionType: message"} as JSON.

  2. handle_function_call() — wraps the entire dispatch in a secondary try/except that returns {"error": "Error executing tool_name: message"}.

This ensures the model always receives a well-formed JSON string, never an unhandled exception.

Agent-loop tools

Four tools are intercepted before registry dispatch because they need agent-level state (TodoStore, MemoryStore, etc.):

  • todo — planning/task tracking
  • memory — persistent memory writes
  • session_search — cross-session recall
  • delegate_task — spawns subagent sessions

These tools' schemas are still registered in the registry (for get_tool_definitions), but their handlers return a stub error if dispatch somehow reaches them directly.

Async bridging

When a tool handler is async, _run_async() bridges it to the sync dispatch path:

  • CLI path (no running loop) — uses a persistent event loop to keep cached async clients alive
  • Gateway path (running loop) — spins up a disposable thread with asyncio.run()
  • Worker threads (parallel tools) — uses per-thread persistent loops stored in thread-local storage

The DANGEROUS_PATTERNS approval flow

The terminal tool integrates a dangerous-command approval system defined in tools/approval.py:

  1. Pattern detectionDANGEROUS_PATTERNS is a list of (regex, description) tuples covering destructive operations:

    • Recursive deletes (rm -rf)
    • Filesystem formatting (mkfs, dd)
    • SQL destructive operations (DROP TABLE, DELETE FROM without WHERE)
    • System config overwrites (> /etc/)
    • Service manipulation (systemctl stop)
    • Remote code execution (curl | sh)
    • Fork bombs, process kills, etc.
  2. Detection — before executing any terminal command, detect_dangerous_command(command) checks against all patterns.

  3. Approval prompt — if a match is found:

    • CLI mode — an interactive prompt asks the user to approve, deny, or allow permanently
    • Gateway mode — an async approval callback sends the request to the messaging platform
    • Smart approval — optionally, an auxiliary LLM can auto-approve low-risk commands that match patterns (e.g., rm -rf node_modules/ is safe but matches "recursive delete")
  4. Session state — approvals are tracked per-session. Once you approve "recursive delete" for a session, subsequent rm -rf commands don't re-prompt.

  5. Permanent allowlist — the "allow permanently" option writes the pattern to config.yaml's command_allowlist, persisting across sessions.

Terminal/runtime environments

The terminal system supports multiple backends:

  • local
  • docker
  • ssh
  • singularity
  • modal
  • daytona

It also supports:

  • per-task cwd overrides
  • background process management
  • PTY mode
  • approval callbacks for dangerous commands

Concurrency

Tool calls may execute sequentially or concurrently depending on the tool mix and interaction requirements.