Hermes Agent Update Analysis
Feature Recommendations for Steve & Gambit

Executive Summary

Key Takeaways

• Top priority: Telegram formatting update — Steve's primary Hermes interface is Telegram. New rich formatting (tables, embedded lists, inline styling, smoother streaming) directly improves every interaction with no config changes.
• Background sub-agents are a force multiplier — Automatic delegation means vault pipeline steps could run concurrently. New sub-agent tree UI provides real-time visibility into parallel work.
• Smarter self-improvement reduces skill drift — Hermes now actively patches its own skills during use, reducing manual skill maintenance.
• Skills Hub supplements existing skill set — Browse-and-install hub for discovery. Use Finn's method: inspect, then have Hermes build a custom version.
• Profile builder enables multi-agent expansion — Spin up specialized profiles ("Researcher", "Coder") with separate models/skills — no config files needed.
• iMessage and Unreal Engine are not relevant — Steve's interface is Telegram; his domain is research briefs, not game dev.
• Desktop app is useful only if transitioning to desktop — Multi-window, model selector, built-in terminal are valuable but Steve is Telegram/mobile-first.

Key Findings

1 Enhanced Telegram Formatting

Hermes now supports rich Telegram formatting: tables, inline code blocks, nested lists, bold/italic, and smoother text streaming. Alex Finn demonstrates a stock portfolio table with columns for stock name, description, price, and market cap. For Steve, this is the single highest-value update because Telegram is his exclusive Hermes interface (treadmill-to-Telegram workflow). Every vault deploy notification, brief summary, cron output, and status update will display more cleanly — no configuration changes needed. [Source 1]

2 Automatic Background Sub-Agents

Background sub-agents now trigger automatically without a manual flag. Users can continue chatting while complex tasks run in parallel. The new sub-agent tree UI shows real-time tool calls across all spawned agents (Finn demonstrates 5 agents doing 28 tool calls simultaneously). For Steve's vault pipeline, this means multi-stage workflows (synthesis → HTML generation → manifest update → deploy) could run concurrently in background while the foreground chat remains responsive. [Source 1]

3 Smarter Self-Improvement

Hermes now creates, patches, and updates its own skills more aggressively during use. Finn shows his Unreal Engine MCP skill being iteratively improved until it became "excellent." For Steve, this means pipeline skills improve autonomously — youtube-to-brief, brief-to-slides, and deploy-site catch and fix their own issues rather than requiring manual skill_manage patches. The key behavioral shift: trust Hermes more with skill self-management rather than maintaining corrections manually. [Source 1]

4 Skills Hub

The Skills Hub provides a browsable library of hundreds of pre-built skills with security scanning. While Steve already maintains a curated skillset, the hub offers discovery of complementary capabilities. Finn recommends an "inspect → have Hermes build your own version" workflow — use the hub for inspiration, then generate a custom Provenance Labs-tailored skill. [Source 1]

5 Profile Builder

The visual profile builder replaces manual config-file editing for creating specialized Hermes profiles. Choose name, model, and skills through an onboarding wizard. For Steve, this opens multi-agent architecture: a "Researcher" profile on DeepSeek V4 Flash for content synthesis, a "Coder" profile for pipeline code, and the default "Gambit" for deploy operations — each with its own skill set and behavior. [Source 1]

6 Desktop App & iMessage

Updated desktop app: multi-window sessions, visual model selector, built-in terminal, sub-agent tree. Native iMessage via Photon: phone-number gateway for iOS. Both are significant platform expansions but low urgency for Steve — Telegram is the stable primary interface. Worth noting for future platform shifts but not actionable today. [Source 1]

7 Unreal Engine 5.8 MCP

Unreal Engine 5.8's new MCP support allows Hermes to build 3D games and environments. Zero relevance to research brief and vault pipeline workflow. Noted for awareness only. [Source 1]

Risks, Gaps & Uncertainty

• This brief is derived from a YouTube walkthrough, not official Hermes documentation — feature descriptions may be incomplete or contain creator interpretation
• Alex Finn is a Hermes power user and content creator — his workflow priorities may not align with Steve's (he uses the desktop app heavily; Steve uses Telegram)
• Background sub-agents' automatic triggering threshold is undocumented — experimentation needed
• Smarter self-improvement's skill patching could introduce regressions in established pipeline behavior
• Skills Hub quality is unverified — security scan doesn't guarantee skill usefulness
• Multi-profile coordination (cross-profile memory, skill sharing) is not covered in the video
• Telegram formatting improvements may require the latest Hermes version — verify before testing

Recommended Next Actions

Annotated References