Index Network Hermes Plugin

The Index plugin connects Hermes to Index over plain HTTPS against the Index REST API, authenticated with this device's own Index session.

Connect

hermes plugins install indexnetwork/hermes-plugin

Connect to Index by opening the Index dashboard and choosing log in with browser — the same /cli-auth handshake the Index CLI and Mac app use. The web page runs the device authorization grant against your browser session and returns a short-lived device code, which the plugin exchanges for its own session token and persists as INDEX_SESSION_TOKEN in the Hermes env file. There is no approval prompt. Sign out revokes that session server-side and clears the local file. On a headless host the dashboard shows the login link to open elsewhere.

Optional overrides: INDEX_API_URL (the bare API origin, without /api; defaults to https://protocol.index.network). Browser login pairs with the configured API environment (INDEX_APP_BASE_URL wins, else derived from INDEX_API_URL).

Every declared function is one request against a named REST resource (/intents, /networks, /opportunities, /docs). Failures remain structured; rejected writes are never replayed.

The session authenticates you, not an agent. GET /agents/me returns the agent you selected as your negotiator in the web app; pick one there before expecting an answer.

Personal agent

Hermes runs the same negotiator as hosted Index — @indexnetwork/agent — rather than a second copy of the state machine. The package still owns eligibility, one POST per turn, contextVersion, the principal inbox, and checkpoints. Hermes is only the speaker: it runs constrained AIAgent loops on Index-platform sessions.

Choosing Hermes as your negotiator — in the dashboard under Settings → Advanced, or in the Index web app — starts a Bun sidecar (runtime/dist/negotiator.js) as a child of the Hermes gateway. Bun must be installed. It restarts if that child exits, and stops when the gateway does or the selection moves. Keep the gateway running. Choosing the hosted Index negotiator, or another registered agent, stops the sidecar.

For one signal with N matches the speaker creates 1 think session + N speaker sessions, lazily, and reuses them:

• Think: {intentId}:think — inbox review working transcript
• Speak: {opportunityId} — the A2A working transcript for that match

Settled matches keep their history but are not woken. Your Telegram or Discord chat is not one of these sessions. Questions, options, and your answers live on the owner's agent DM — one conversation per signal, shown on Discover's signal detail and on Index web (IntentNegotiatorChat), the same DM the hosted negotiator uses.

The plugin follows GET /events. A frame that names a signal wakes the sidecar; frames close together collapse into one wake. principal.input is an owner answer or message from that chat and is applied instead of a wake. The sidecar reads authoritative state over REST before deciding, and each reconnection reconciles against GET /negotiations. Type on a think or speaker session is ignored.

Negotiation checkpoints stay in one JSON file per signal under $HERMES_HOME/index-network/negotiator/. Every restored match reads current Index state before deciding, and a turn is attempted at most once. Turns include ?executorId=<agent UUID> so Index refuses work from an agent that is no longer selected.

Disable the index platform in Hermes to stop listening, or change the selected executor in Index. The sidecar stops with it. A failed H2A publish stays undelivered and is offered again.

Development

Build generated output only through its scripts:

cd packages/hermes-plugin
bun run build:desktop
bun run typecheck:runtime && bun run build:runtime
python3 -m compileall -q .
hermes plugins doctor . --ci

plugin.yaml is the static package capability union. Do not edit desktop/dist/plugin.js or runtime/dist/negotiator.js manually.

runtime/ is the negotiator host: it wires @indexnetwork/agent to Index REST and asks Hermes to speak or think. It is bundled into runtime/dist/negotiator.js so the published plugin carries no npm dependency on the monorepo. Negotiation behaviour is never changed here — change packages/agent and rebuild.