# Daily Hermes + AI Research Brief — 2026-05-20

## Important updates

- **Hermes Agent v0.13 / “Tenacity” remains the key Hermes update to track.** GitHub release/search results list v2026.5.7 with Kanban as a durable multi-agent board, heartbeat/reclaim/zombie detection/auto-block behavior, and a large reliability-focused release since v0.12.0. This matters because Will’s Atlas setup already depends on default gateway stability plus specialist profiles/Kanban for durable work. Source: [NousResearch/hermes-agent releases](https://github.com/NousResearch/hermes-agent/releases).
- **Hermes docs continue to emphasize self-improving skills, persistent memory, profiles, gateway, plugins, MCP, cron, and Kanban.** For Will, the practical takeaway is to keep Atlas’ daily operations split between short memory pointers, Obsidian for durable context, and specialist-profile delegation rather than stuffing everything into one long session. Source: [Hermes Agent Documentation](https://hermes-agent.nousresearch.com/docs/).
- **OpenAI Codex CLI shipped another May update.** The Codex changelog shows “Codex CLI 0.130.0” on 2026-05-08 with performance improvements/bug fixes. This is relevant because Will’s Hermes workers/profiles use Codex auth in some paths; keep profile auth smoke tests in the loop before dispatching autonomous coding agents. Source: [OpenAI Codex changelog](https://developers.openai.com/codex/changelog).
- **1Password announced/covered just-in-time credential access for Codex via MCP.** The useful pattern is not the vendor hype; it is the architecture: coding agents should request narrowly scoped, auditable secrets at task time instead of having broad static env access. This maps directly to safer Hermes MCP/tool credentials and swarm service secrets. Source: [SiliconANGLE coverage](https://siliconangle.com/2026/05/20/1password-extends-openai-collaboration-codex-mcp-server-just-time-credential-access/).
- **MCP remains the practical integration layer to watch.** Recent MCP comparisons and Anthropic engineering material emphasize implementing tools once and exposing them across agent clients. For Will, this supports consolidating local services—Obsidian, n8n, Ollama/llama.cpp, Kokoro/Whisper—behind stable MCP/tool wrappers instead of one-off scripts. Sources: [ClickHouse MCP framework comparison](https://clickhouse.com/blog/how-to-build-ai-agents-mcp-12-frameworks), [Anthropic on MCP code execution](https://www.anthropic.com/engineering/code-execution-with-mcp).
- **AI observability is moving from infra-only metrics to LLM-specific monitoring.** Current LLMOps guidance stresses that healthy CPU/GPU dashboards do not prove agent quality; you need latency, error rates, tool-call failures, prompt/model routing traces, and evaluation signals. This is directly useful for Will’s CoreWeave/GPU/k8s-style work and local swarm reliability. Source: [Kong AI observability guide](https://konghq.com/blog/learning-center/guide-to-ai-observability).

## Actionable ideas for us

- **[quick]** Add a recurring manual check item for Hermes release notes: compare local `~/.hermes/hermes-agent` against `origin/main` and v2026.5.7+ release notes, but only use the safe isolated update flow.
- **[quick]** Smoke-test specialist profiles that may use Codex: `hermes -p <profile> chat -q 'Reply exactly: ok' --toolsets safe -Q` before Kanban dispatch.
- **[experiment]** Prototype an MCP-style “just-in-time secret” pattern locally: agent requests a named credential lease for one task; logs scope and expiration; never exposes raw secrets in final output.
- **[watch]** Track Hermes Kanban reliability and session-rollover/handoff changes; these are likely to matter more for Atlas autonomy than flashy model announcements.

## Worth ignoring

- Generic “AI agents in 2026” listicles with no implementation detail.
- Funding/partnership headlines unless they ship concrete APIs, MCP servers, model routing, or local-first tooling.
- Consumer chatbot feature news with no path to Hermes, Obsidian, n8n, local inference, or GPU ops.
