`serve` (added in #54568) reused cmd_dashboard wholesale, so it still
behaved like a dashboard: it ran a full vite build every launch, mounted
and served the SPA whenever a stray web_dist/ existed, printed
"Hermes Web UI →", and announced HERMES_DASHBOARD_READY. It's the headless
JSON-RPC/WS backend the desktop app and remote clients run — pure socket
clients that never load the browser SPA.
Mark serve with headless_backend=True (resolved once in cmd_dashboard) and:
- skip _build_web_ui entirely on the serve path
- export HERMES_SERVE_HEADLESS=1 so mount_spa() disables the SPA even when a
dist is present — only the JSON-RPC/WS/API surface is reachable
- announce the bind ("Hermes backend listening on host:port") instead of a
browser/auth-gated URL
- print a neutral HERMES_BACKEND_READY sentinel; dashboard keeps the legacy
one and the desktop port-discovery regex matches either
- preserve serve across the named-profile re-exec so it can't rebuild as
dashboard
`hermes dashboard` is unchanged (builds + serves the browser UI). Backward
compatible: old apps only ever spawn dashboard (legacy token + UI intact)
and never invoke serve; the ready-file side channel is name-agnostic. The
one behavior change is that a remote `hermes serve` no longer serves the
browser dashboard as a side effect — that's `hermes dashboard`'s job.
Tests: serve headless_backend contract, SPA-disabled-with-dist, the
HERMES_BACKEND_READY desktop parse (17/17 node), and the existing
serve/dashboard/web_server suites. AGENTS.md documents the behavior.
Bring apps/desktop and ui-tui to a clean state for typecheck, eslint,
and prettier:
- Run prettier across both trees (printWidth/wrap drift; prettier is not
CI-enforced for these JS projects, so main had accumulated drift).
- Apply eslint --fix for padding-line-between-statements and perfectionist
import/export sorting.
- Manual fixes for non-auto-fixable rules:
- remove unused node:net import in electron/main.cjs (uses Electron net)
- replace inline `typeof import(...)` annotations with top-level
`import type * as EnvModule` in two ui-tui test files
- scoped eslint-disable no-control-regex on intentional sentinel/ANSI
regexes (mathUnicode.ts, text.ts)
- resolve react-hooks/exhaustive-deps per-case: correct swapped/missing
deps, collapse redundant session.* members, and justified disables on
settings mount-only data-load effects to preserve run-once behavior
No behavior changes; test pass/fail counts are unchanged from the main
baseline.
The port-announcement clock in waitForDashboardPort starts the instant the
backend process is spawned — before uvicorn binds its socket. On a cold
install the child first compiles and imports the whole hermes_cli.main ->
web_server -> FastAPI/uvicorn chain, and on Windows real-time AV scans every
freshly written .pyc. That pre-bind cost can exceed the old hardcoded 45s
deadline, so the desktop killed a healthy-but-still-starting backend and
respawned it, piling up orphaned processes (#50209).
Raise the default to 90s and make it overridable via
HERMES_DESKTOP_PORT_ANNOUNCE_TIMEOUT_MS, clamped to a 45s floor so a bad
override can't reintroduce the loop. Warm starts still announce in well under
a second; both call sites inherit the new default with no change. Adds
backend-ready.test.cjs (wired into test:desktop:platforms).
Replace the PortPool-based port reservation system (9120-9199 range) with OS-assigned ephemeral ports via --port 0.
Before: Desktop probed a hardcoded port range, reserved ports in-process to close TOCTOU races, and passed the chosen port to the dashboard via CLI arg.
After: Desktop spawns dashboard with --port 0, parses the actual port from a stdout announcement line (HERMES_DASHBOARD_READY port=<N>), and uses that for WebSocket connections.
Changes:
- web_server.py: add --port 0 support with SO_REUSEADDR pre-bind + announcement; add EADDRINUSE preflight for explicit ports
- main.cjs: remove PortPool, PORT_FLOOR/CEILING, pickPort(), isPortAvailable(); add waitForDashboardPort() stdout parser
- Delete port-pool.cjs and port-pool.test.cjs (106 lines removed)
Net effect: eliminates the entire TOCTOU-mitigation reservation infrastructure and arbitrary port range constraints. OS handles port allocation natively.
