Workers completing a kanban task can now claim the ids of cards they
created via an optional ``created_cards`` field on ``kanban_complete``.
The kernel verifies each id exists and was created by the completing
worker's profile; any phantom id blocks the completion with a
``HallucinatedCardsError`` and records a
``completion_blocked_hallucination`` event on the task so the rejected
attempt is auditable. Successful completions also get a non-blocking
prose-scan pass over their ``summary`` + ``result`` that emits a
``suspected_hallucinated_references`` event for any ``t_<hex>``
reference that doesn't resolve.
Closes#20017.
Recovery UX (kernel + CLI + dashboard)
--------------------------------------
A structural gate alone isn't enough — operators also need to see and
act on stuck workers, especially when a profile's model is the root
cause. This PR ships the full loop:
* ``kanban_db.reclaim_task(task_id)`` — operator-driven reclaim that
releases an active worker claim immediately (unlike
``release_stale_claims`` which only acts after claim_expires has
passed). Emits a ``reclaimed`` event with ``manual: True`` payload.
* ``kanban_db.reassign_task(task_id, profile, reclaim_first=...)`` —
switch a task to a different profile, optionally reclaiming a stuck
running worker in the same call.
* ``hermes kanban reclaim <id> [--reason ...]`` and
``hermes kanban reassign <id> <profile> [--reclaim] [--reason ...]``
CLI subcommands wired through to the same helpers.
* ``POST /api/plugins/kanban/tasks/{id}/reclaim`` and
``POST /api/plugins/kanban/tasks/{id}/reassign`` endpoints on the
dashboard plugin.
Dashboard surfacing
-------------------
* ⚠ **warning badge** on cards with active hallucination events.
* **attention strip** at the top of the board listing all flagged
tasks; dismissible per session.
* **events callout** in the task drawer — hallucination events render
with a red left border, amber icon, and phantom ids as styled chips.
* **recovery section** in the task drawer with three actions: Reclaim,
Reassign (with profile picker + reclaim-first checkbox), and a
copy-to-clipboard hint for ``hermes -p <profile> model`` since
profile config lives on disk and can't be edited from the browser.
Auto-opens when the task has warnings, collapsed otherwise.
Keyed by task id so state doesn't leak between drawers.
Active-vs-stale rule: warnings clear when a clean ``completed`` or
``edited`` event supersedes the hallucination, so recovery is never
permanently stigmatising — the audit events persist for debugging but
the badge goes away once the worker succeeds.
Skill updates
-------------
* ``skills/devops/kanban-worker/SKILL.md`` documents the
``created_cards`` contract with good/bad examples.
* ``skills/devops/kanban-orchestrator/SKILL.md`` gains a "Recovering
stuck workers" section with the three actions and when to use each.
Tests
-----
* Kernel gate: verified-cards manifest, phantom rejection + audit
event, cross-worker rejection, prose scan positive + negative.
* Recovery helpers: reclaim on running task, reclaim on non-running
returns False, reassign refuses running without reclaim_first,
reassign with reclaim_first succeeds on running.
* API endpoints: warnings field present on /board and /tasks/:id,
warnings cleared after clean completion, reclaim 200 + 409 paths,
reassign 200 + 409 + reclaim_first paths.
* CLI smoke: reclaim + reassign subcommands.
Live-verified end-to-end on a dashboard with seeded scenarios:
attention strip renders, badges land on the right cards, drawer
callout shows phantom chips, Reclaim on a running task flips status to
ready + emits manual reclaimed event + refreshes the drawer,
Reassign swaps the assignee and triggers board refresh.
359/359 kanban-suite tests pass
(test_kanban_{db,cli,boards,core_functionality} + dashboard + tools).
After PR #20105 (dispatcher skips ready tasks whose assignee fails
``profile_exists()`` to prevent the orion-cc/orion-research crash
loop), the gateway and CLI emit a spurious "kanban dispatcher stuck:
ready queue non-empty for N consecutive ticks but 0 workers spawned"
warning every 5 minutes on multi-lane setups where the queue is
steadily full of human-pulled work assigned to terminal lanes.
The warn is intended to catch real failure modes (broken PATH,
missing venv, credential loss for a real Hermes profile). On a
multi-lane host it fires forever even though everything is healthy:
the dispatcher correctly chose not to spawn, and there is nothing
for the operator to fix.
Changes:
* ``DispatchResult`` gains a ``skipped_nonspawnable`` field
(separate from ``skipped_unassigned``) so callers can distinguish
"task missing an owner — operator should route it" from "task
owned by a control-plane lane — terminal will pull it".
* ``dispatch_once`` routes the ``not profile_exists(assignee)`` skip
into the new bucket (was lumped into ``skipped_unassigned``).
* New helper ``has_spawnable_ready(conn)`` returns True iff at least
one ready+assigned+unclaimed task in the DB has an assignee that
maps to a real Hermes profile. Falls back to legacy "any
ready+assigned" when ``profile_exists`` is unimportable so degraded
installs still surface the original warn.
* The gateway dispatcher (``gateway/run.py``) and the CLI standalone
daemon (``hermes_cli/kanban.py``) both swap their cheap
``ready_nonempty`` probe to use ``has_spawnable_ready``. Stuck-warn
now fires only when there is genuine spawnable work the dispatcher
failed to start.
* CLI dispatch output prints ``Skipped (non-spawnable assignee —
terminal lane, OK)`` for visibility without alarm.
Tests:
* New ``has_spawnable_ready`` cases (empty queue, terminal-lane
only, mixed real+terminal).
* New ``test_dispatch_skips_nonspawnable_into_separate_bucket``
verifies the bucketing change.
* Updated ``test_dispatch_skips_unassigned`` to assert no
cross-leak.
* Added ``all_assignees_spawnable`` fixture in
``tests/hermes_cli/conftest.py`` and threaded it through dispatcher
tests that use synthetic assignees ("alice", "bob"). PR #20105
(the parent commit) silently broke 8 such tests by routing those
assignees into ``skipped_nonspawnable`` instead of spawning; this
PR repairs them as part of the same code area.
Verified locally: 246/246 kanban-suite tests pass.
Stacks on top of fix/kanban-dispatcher-skip-missing-profile-2026-05-05
(PR #20105). Reviewer: this PR is meant to merge AFTER #20105.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.7 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
Adds first-class board support to kanban so users can separate unrelated
streams of work (projects, repos, domains) into isolated queues. Single-
project users stay on the 'default' board and see no UI change.
Isolation model
---------------
- Each board is a directory at `~/.hermes/kanban/boards/<slug>/` with
its own `kanban.db`, `workspaces/`, and `logs/`. The 'default' board
keeps its legacy path (`~/.hermes/kanban.db`) for back-compat — fresh
installs and pre-boards users get zero migration.
- Workers spawned by the dispatcher have `HERMES_KANBAN_BOARD` pinned in
their env alongside the existing `HERMES_KANBAN_DB` /
`HERMES_KANBAN_WORKSPACES_ROOT` pins, so workers physically cannot see
other boards' tasks.
- The gateway's single dispatcher loop now sweeps every board per tick;
per-tick cost is a few extra filesystem stats.
- CAS concurrency guarantees are preserved per-board (each board is its
own SQLite DB, same WAL+IMMEDIATE machinery as before).
CLI
---
hermes kanban boards list|create|switch|show|rename|rm
hermes kanban --board <slug> <any-subcommand>
Board resolution order: `--board` flag → `HERMES_KANBAN_BOARD` env →
`~/.hermes/kanban/current` file → `default`. Slug validation is strict:
lowercase alphanumerics + hyphens + underscores, 1-64 chars, starts with
alphanumeric. Uppercase is auto-downcased; slashes / dots / `..` /
control chars are rejected so boards can't name their way out of the
boards/ directory.
Passive discoverability: when more than one board exists, `hermes kanban
list` prints a one-line header ("Board: foo (2 other boards …)") so
users who stumble across multi-project never have to hunt for the
feature. Invisible for single-board installs.
Dashboard
---------
- New `BoardSwitcher` component at the top of the Kanban tab: dropdown
with all boards + task counts, `+ New board` button, `Archive`
button (non-default only). Hidden entirely when only `default` exists
and is empty — single-project users never see it.
- New `NewBoardDialog` modal: slug / display name / description / icon
+ "switch to this board after creating" checkbox.
- Selected board persists to `localStorage` so browser users don't
shift the CLI's active board out from under a terminal they left open.
- New `?board=<slug>` query param on every existing endpoint plus a
new `/boards` CRUD surface (`GET /boards`, `POST /boards`,
`PATCH /boards/<slug>`, `DELETE /boards/<slug>`,
`POST /boards/<slug>/switch`).
- Events WebSocket is pinned to a board at connection time; switching
opens a fresh WS against the new board.
Also fixes a pre-existing bug in the plugin's tenant / assignee
filters: the SDK's `Select` uses `onValueChange(value)`, not
native `onChange(event)`, so those filters silently didn't work.
New `selectChangeHandler` helper wires both signatures.
Tests
-----
49 new tests in `tests/hermes_cli/test_kanban_boards.py` covering:
slug validation (valid / invalid / auto-downcase), path resolution
(default = legacy path, named = `boards/<slug>/`, env var override),
current-board resolution chain (env > file > default), board CRUD +
archive / hard-delete, per-board connection isolation (tasks don't
leak), worker spawn env injection (`HERMES_KANBAN_BOARD`,
`HERMES_KANBAN_DB`, `HERMES_KANBAN_WORKSPACES_ROOT` all point at the
right board), and end-to-end CLI surface.
Regression surface: all 264 pre-existing kanban tests continue to pass.
Live-tested via the dashboard: created 3 boards (default,
hermes-agent, atm10-server), created tasks on each via both CLI
(`--board <slug> create`) and dashboard (inline create on the Ready
column), confirmed zero cross-board leakage, confirmed `BoardSwitcher`
+ `NewBoardDialog` work end-to-end in the browser.
The Kanban board is documented as shared across all Hermes profiles, but
`kanban_db_path()` and `workspaces_root()` resolved through `get_hermes_home()`,
which returns the active profile's HERMES_HOME. When the dispatcher spawned a
worker with `hermes -p <profile> --skills kanban-worker chat -q "work kanban
task <id>"`, the worker rewrote HERMES_HOME to the profile subdirectory before
kanban_db.py imported, opening a profile-local `kanban.db` that did not contain
the dispatcher's task. `kanban_show` and `kanban_complete` failed; the
dispatcher's row stayed `running` and was retried/crashed. The same defect
applied to `_default_spawn`'s log directory and `worker_log_path`, so
`hermes kanban tail` did not see the worker's output.
Add `kanban_home()` in `hermes_cli/kanban_db.py` that resolves through
`HERMES_KANBAN_HOME` (explicit override) then `get_default_hermes_root()`,
which already understands the `<root>/profiles/<name>` and Docker / custom
HERMES_HOME shapes. Reroute `kanban_db_path`, `workspaces_root`, the
`_default_spawn` log directory, `gc_worker_logs`, and `worker_log_path`
through it. Profile-specific config, `.env`, memory, and sessions stay
isolated as before; only the kanban surface is shared.
Add a `TestSharedBoardPaths` regression class to `tests/hermes_cli/test_kanban_db.py`
covering: default install, profile-worker convergence, Docker custom HERMES_HOME,
Docker profile layout, explicit `HERMES_KANBAN_HOME` override, and a real
SQLite round-trip across dispatcher and worker HERMES_HOME perspectives.
The dispatcher/worker convergence tests fail on origin/main and pass after
the fix.
Update the `kanban.md` user-guide page and the misleading docstrings in
`kanban_db.py` to describe the shared-root behavior.
Fixes#19348
New `hermes kanban` CLI subcommand + `/kanban` slash command + skills for
worker and orchestrator profiles. SQLite-backed task board
(~/.hermes/kanban.db) shared across all profiles on the host. Zero
changes to run_agent.py, no new core tools, no tool-schema bloat.
Motivation: delegate_task is a function call — sync fork/join, anonymous
subagent, no resumability, no human-in-the-loop. Kanban is the durable
shape needed for research triage, scheduled ops, digital twins,
engineering pipelines, and fleet work. They coexist (workers may call
delegate_task internally).
What this adds
- hermes_cli/kanban_db.py — schema, CAS claim, dependency resolution,
dispatcher, workspace resolution, worker-context builder.
- hermes_cli/kanban.py — 15-verb CLI surface and shared run_slash()
entry point used by both CLI and gateway.
- skills/devops/kanban-worker — how a profile should work a claimed task.
- skills/devops/kanban-orchestrator — "you are a dispatcher, not a
worker" template with anti-temptation rules.
- /kanban slash command wired into cli.py and gateway/run.py. Bypasses
the running-agent guard (board writes don't touch agent state), so
/kanban unblock can free a stuck worker mid-conversation.
- Design spec at docs/hermes-kanban-v1-spec.pdf — comparative analysis
vs Cline Kanban, Paperclip, NanoClaw, Gemini Enterprise; 8 patterns;
4 user stories; implementation plan; concurrency correctness.
- Docs: website/docs/user-guide/features/kanban.md, CLI reference
updated, sidebar entry added.
Architecture highlights
- Three planes: control (user + gateway), state (board + dispatcher),
execution (pool of profile processes).
- Every worker is a full OS process, spawned as `hermes -p <profile>`.
No in-process subagent swarms — solves NanoClaw's SDK-lifecycle
failure class.
- Atomic claim via SQLite CAS in a BEGIN IMMEDIATE transaction; stale
claims reclaimed 15 min after their TTL expires.
- Tenant namespacing via one nullable column — one specialist fleet
can serve many businesses with data isolation by workspace path.
Tests: 60 targeted tests (schema, CAS atomicity, dependency resolution,
dispatcher, workspace kinds, tenancy, CLI + slash surface). All pass
hermetic via scripts/run_tests.sh.
Teknium