Agent stack build plans · № 6 · 5 of 6

The prompts

Five stages, pasted into Hermes itself, in order. Days apart, not minutes.

These go straight into a hermes session (stage 3’s output becomes the cron job). They assume setup is done: token in place, gateway running, approvals.mode: manual. Note the prompts name the real tools — ha_list_entities, not the list_entities that circulates in AI answers.

Call ha_list_entities and build me a house map: every entity grouped by
room, with its exact entity_id, domain, and the human name we'd use for it
in conversation ("the reading lamp" -> light.living_room_lamp_2). Where a
name is ambiguous or an entity looks orphaned, ask me — do not guess.

Then create a skill called house-map (use skill_manage) whose SKILL.md
contains the final table, plus one hard rule at the top: never call
ha_call_service on an entity_id that is not in this map — ask me instead.

Finish by telling me which domains you'd suggest for watch_domains and
which chatty entities belong in ignore_entities, based on what you saw.

I'm going to dictate our house rules. Use the memory tool to store them —
terse, one line each, because MEMORY.md caps at 2,200 characters and I want
room left for patterns you'll learn later. Confirm the character count after.

Rules to start with (I'll add more):
- Lamps on within 10 minutes of sunset on weekdays; silently.
- Never touch light.living_room_lamp_2 (the reading lamp) unless asked.
- Quiet hours 22:30–07:30: no messages unless it's a security or water issue.
- Locks, alarm, and the garage NEVER move without an explicit yes from me.
- If heating is on and a window sensor reads open for 15+ min, tell me.
- When an action matches an established pattern, act silently; when it's
  novel, message me first.

Create a cron job with the cronjob tool: every night at 23:30, do this —

1. Use session_search to review today's Home Assistant events and our
   conversations.
2. Look for recurring patterns worth remembering: arrival/departure times by
   weekday, things repeatedly left on or open, nudges I said yes to, nudges
   I ignored (an ignored nudge is a pattern too — stop sending it).
3. Message me on Telegram with at most 3 proposed memory changes, each one
   line, with your evidence ("garage left open >60 min on 4 of the last 9
   evenings"). Apply only what I approve, via the memory tool.
4. If MEMORY.md is within 200 characters of its cap, propose which existing
   line to drop before adding anything.

Never auto-apply. Distill, propose, wait.

For the next 7 days, run in shadow mode: when an event suggests an action,
message me what you WOULD do and why (cite the memory rule or pattern),
but only act if I say yes. Keep count.

After 7 days, send me a report: which proposed actions I approved every
time (candidates for acting silently), which I rejected (delete or fix the
rule that produced them), and what the week cost in model calls. We'll
promote the reliable ones to act-without-asking one at a time.

You work for the whole household, and so far only I have written rules.
Generate house-rules.html: one self-contained page, readable by a
non-technical person, with the house map (rooms and plain names, not
entity_ids), every current rule from memory, and what you do at each stage
of the evening.

Then add the twocents MCP server (https://twocents.page/mcp — you can
connect any MCP server; add it to your config and restart so the tools
load). Call share_page with the full contents of house-rules.html and give
me the review link — I'll send it to the rest of the household. They pin
notes directly on the page, no login: "never turn off my reading lamp",
"the quiet hours should start at 21:30 on school nights".

When the notes are in, call get_feedback with the room id, read me each
note, and fold the ones I approve into memory — terse, under the cap.

Why stage 5 is not optional

Every rule so far encodes one person’s model of the house. The people the agent will actually annoy are the ones who never saw the config — and they won’t file an issue, they’ll just override the thermostat and quietly resent your robot. A page they can pin a note on is the lowest-friction way to find the reading-lamp rule before it becomes a Tuesday-night argument.