fix(web): cross-platform sync-assets + surface build errors on failure

Three Windows-only bugs in the web-dashboard build path. Each is small,
scoped, and verified end-to-end on Windows 11 — including under a stock
cmd.exe / PowerShell console with its default cp1252 encoding.

1. `sync-assets` shells out to Unix-only commands

   web/package.json hard-codes `rm -rf … && cp -r …`. Neither exists on
   Windows cmd.exe. `hermes_cli/main.py::_build_web_ui` runs npm via
   subprocess (which on Windows defaults to cmd.exe), so the prebuild
   hook crashed before Vite ever ran and the dashboard never built.

   Fix: web/scripts/sync-assets.mjs — ~20 lines of Node using fs.rmSync
   + fs.cpSync (stdlib, Node >= 16.7). No new deps, identical behavior
   on POSIX and Windows.

2. Build failures were silent

   _build_web_ui ran both subprocess calls with capture_output=True and
   never relayed the captured buffers on failure. Users saw 'Web UI
   build failed' and nothing else — no stdout, no stderr, no hint that
   the real problem was 'rm is not recognized'.

   Fix: inner _relay() helper that decodes and prints stdout + stderr
   (utf-8, errors='replace') whenever a step returns non-zero. Replaces
   the existing stderr_tail-only relay on the build path; success path
   is unchanged. (stderr_tail is preserved for the stale-dist fallback
   branch added by #23817.)

Salvaged from #13368 by @johnisag onto current main. Conflict
resolution preserves main's improvements:
- _run_npm_install_deterministic() (replaces bare subprocess.run for
  npm install)
- npm-build retry-after-sleep for Windows boot-time races (#23817)
- stale-dist fallback for non-interactive callers (#23817)

Closes #25073, #13368.

hermes_cli/main.py

@@ -5688,12 +5688,29 @@ def _build_web_ui(web_dir: Path, *, fatal: bool = False) -> bool:
             print("Install Node.js, then run:  cd web && npm install && npm run build")
         return not fatal
     print("→ Building web UI...")
+
+    def _relay(result: "subprocess.CompletedProcess") -> None:
+        """Print captured npm output so users can see *why* a step failed.
+
+        Windows users hitting `rm -rf` / `cp -r` errors (or any other
+        sync-assets / Vite failure) would otherwise see only ``Web UI
+        build failed`` with no hint of the underlying cause, because
+        the npm calls run with ``capture_output=True``.
+        """
+        for blob in (result.stdout, result.stderr):
+            if not blob:
+                continue
+            text = blob.decode("utf-8", errors="replace").rstrip() if isinstance(blob, bytes) else blob.rstrip()
+            if text:
+                print(text)
+
     r1 = _run_npm_install_deterministic(npm, web_dir, extra_args=("--silent",))
     if r1.returncode != 0:
         print(
             f"  {'✗' if fatal else '⚠'} Web UI npm install failed"
             + ("" if fatal else " (hermes web will not be available)")
         )
+        _relay(r1)
         if fatal:
             print("  Run manually:  cd web && npm install && npm run build")
         return False
@@ -5739,8 +5756,7 @@ def _build_web_ui(web_dir: Path, *, fatal: bool = False) -> bool:
             f"  {'✗' if fatal else '⚠'} Web UI build failed"
             + ("" if fatal else " (hermes web will not be available)")
         )
-        if stderr_tail:
+        _relay(r2)
-            print(f"  Build error:\n  {stderr_tail}")
         if fatal:
             print("  Run manually:  cd web && npm install && npm run build")
         return False

web/package.json

@@ -4,7 +4,7 @@
   "version": "0.0.0",
   "type": "module",
   "scripts": {
-    "sync-assets": "node -e \"const fs=require('fs');fs.rmSync('public/fonts',{recursive:true,force:true});fs.rmSync('public/ds-assets',{recursive:true,force:true});fs.cpSync('node_modules/@nous-research/ui/dist/fonts','public/fonts',{recursive:true});fs.cpSync('node_modules/@nous-research/ui/dist/assets','public/ds-assets',{recursive:true});\"",
+    "sync-assets": "node scripts/sync-assets.mjs",
     "predev": "npm run sync-assets",
     "prebuild": "npm run sync-assets",
     "dev": "vite",

web/scripts/sync-assets.mjs

@@ -0,0 +1,27 @@
+#!/usr/bin/env node
+// Cross-platform replacement for the previous shell pipeline:
+//
+//   rm -rf public/fonts public/ds-assets
+//   && cp -r node_modules/@nous-research/ui/dist/fonts public/fonts
+//   && cp -r node_modules/@nous-research/ui/dist/assets public/ds-assets
+//
+// `rm -rf` / `cp -r` don't exist on Windows cmd.exe, so `npm run build`
+// (invoked from Python via subprocess → cmd.exe) failed before Vite ran.
+// Using Node's stdlib fs keeps this dependency-free and platform-neutral.
+
+import { cpSync, rmSync } from "node:fs";
+import { dirname, resolve } from "node:path";
+import { fileURLToPath } from "node:url";
+
+const webRoot = resolve(dirname(fileURLToPath(import.meta.url)), "..");
+const uiDist = resolve(webRoot, "node_modules", "@nous-research", "ui", "dist");
+
+const targets = [
+  { from: resolve(uiDist, "fonts"), to: resolve(webRoot, "public", "fonts") },
+  { from: resolve(uiDist, "assets"), to: resolve(webRoot, "public", "ds-assets") },
+];
+
+for (const { from, to } of targets) {
+  rmSync(to, { recursive: true, force: true });
+  cpSync(from, to, { recursive: true });
+}