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Use Bot Mode for ongoing conversations with named Hermes specialists; use Kanban to assign, persist, and track work across profiles. They solve different coordination problems, so teams doing substantial multi-profile work can use both: keep specialists available as Bots and use Kanban cards for scoped tasks, dependencies, handoffs, and review.
What is the difference between Bot Mode and Kanban?
Bot Mode is a desktop interface for Hermes profiles. A Bot has a role and profile-specific settings, and the interface supports persistent chats, routines, and Bot-to-Bot or group conversations. It presents profiles as named specialists; it does not create a separate kind of agent.
Kanban is a shared task board and dispatcher for multiple profiles. A person or orchestrator creates a task, assigns a profile, and a dispatched worker uses Kanban tools to read and update that task. The board gives work a durable, visible status that can support handoffs, comments, dependencies, and review.
Which should you use for your task?
| What you need | Best fit | Why |
|---|---|---|
| An ongoing conversation with a persistent specialist identity or routines | Bot Mode | The desktop Bot roster and chats surface Hermes profiles and their routines. |
| A short subtask whose answer should return directly to the calling agent | Direct delegation | Delegation suits a brief reasoning request when no durable task record or human handoff is needed. |
| Assigned work that needs durable status, visibility, dependencies, comments, or review | Kanban | The board stores task state and dispatches work to assigned profiles. |
| Specialists doing work that requires tracking and handoffs | Bot Mode plus Kanban | Use profiles for specialist roles and board tasks to scope and track their work. |
Choose based on the coordination requirement, not on which interface seems more powerful. Bot Mode is centered on how a person interacts with persistent specialists; Kanban is centered on the state and movement of assigned work. A short answer can be delegated directly. Work that crosses profiles, must survive restarts, needs human input, or should remain discoverable is a stronger fit for Kanban.
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How to combine Bots and Kanban for parallel research
The following is a workflow design based on documented features, not a claim that a particular run was tested or that parallelism always makes work faster or more accurate.
- Set up stable specialist roles. Define a small set of roles, such as source checker, audience researcher, and synthesis writer. Configure Hermes profiles for those roles and expose them as named Bots in Bot Mode if you want persistent specialist chats.
- Initialize the board and start dispatch. Run
hermes kanban init, thenhermes gateway start. Create one task for each independent workstream, assign the appropriate profile, and specify the question, expected evidence, and completion criteria. - Separate independent work from dependent work. Independent research cards can proceed in parallel. If work must wait for a decision or prerequisite, represent that relationship with a parent or dependency so downstream work is not treated as ready prematurely. Put shared decisions—such as a schema or naming convention—in the task instructions used by all affected workers.
- Make handoffs explicit. Ask workers to put evidence and unresolved questions in the task result or comments. Route finished research to an analyst or synthesis task, then to a writing task; add a review stage when the work needs a quality gate. This sequence is a practical design, not a prescribed editorial pipeline.
- Keep conversations and records in their useful places. Use Bots for ongoing specialist conversations and the board as the durable record for assigned work. Inspect progress with Kanban watch, list, and stats surfaces.
What setup and runtime constraints matter?
Kanban needs an active dispatcher
In the documented default configuration, the Kanban dispatcher is embedded in the Hermes gateway. The gateway checks for ready work on a 60-second default interval, so assigned tasks can wait when the gateway is not running. The official quick start is to initialize the board, start the gateway, create an assigned task, and inspect it with watch, list, or stats.
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Task-management permissions are separate from the board display
Dispatched workers have Kanban worker tools enabled. An orchestrator profile that must create or manage tasks needs the Kanban toolset enabled. The Desktop Kanban plugin displays the board, but installing or using that display does not by itself give the chat agent permission to manage tasks.
Local Bot concurrency depends on warm backend slots
Nous Research’s 2026 Bot Mode documentation lists defaults of three warm local backends, an estimate of approximately 60 MB per warm backend, and a ten-minute idle timeout. It also says a Bot may wait up to 30 seconds for an available local slot before timing out. These are documented software defaults and an estimate, not universal hardware requirements or guarantees; settings and releases can change them. The guide recommends scaling the setting and available memory for larger active Bot fleets.
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Check attachment mounts and shared-board profile names
When workers use remote Docker or Modal terminal backends, mount the Kanban attachment directory into the sandbox if tasks refer to attachment paths; otherwise those paths may not resolve. Shared boards across Hermes homes also require care with profile names and dispatch-profile configuration.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.When is a direct delegation better than a Kanban card?
Use direct delegation when the parent agent needs a short reasoning answer that can return to it immediately and there is no need for human input, persistent status, or discovery later. Choose a Kanban task when the work needs to outlast a conversation, move between agents, wait on dependencies, or be reviewed. A persistent Bot chat is useful for continuing to work with a specialist, but it is not a substitute for a board task when the work itself needs assigned, durable tracking.
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Official Hermes references
- Hermes Agent documentation for Bot Mode and Kanban setup and behavior.
- Hermes Agent CLI reference for command-line behavior.
Product prices and availability are accurate as of the date/time indicated and are subject to change. Any price and availability information displayed on Amazon at the time of purchase will apply.
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