web/ + hermes_cli/web_routers/ — the dashboard (hermes dashboard → /chat)

Applies on top of the root AGENTS.md. Backend routers: hermes_cli/web_routers/*.py, one file per dashboard surface, mounted by hermes_cli/web_server.py (+ web_server_*.py siblings). Frontend: web/src/. Shared JSON-RPC/WS client: apps/shared (@hermes/shared), also used by the desktop.

The dashboard embeds the REAL hermes --tui — not a rewrite

hermes_cli/pty_bridge.py + the @app.websocket("/api/pty") endpoint in web_server.py:

• web/src/pages/ChatPage.tsx mounts xterm.js Terminal with the WebGL renderer, @xterm/addon-fit (container-driven resize) and @xterm/addon-unicode11 (wide-character widths).
• /api/pty?token=… upgrades to a WebSocket; auth uses the same ephemeral _SESSION_TOKEN as REST, passed as a query param because browsers cannot set Authorization on a WS upgrade.
• The server spawns exactly what hermes --tui would spawn, through ptyprocess (POSIX PTY — WSL works, native Windows does not).
• Frames are raw PTY bytes each way; resize travels as \x1b[RESIZE:<cols>;<rows>], intercepted on the server and applied with TIOCSWINSZ.

Do not re-implement the primary chat experience in React. Transcript, composer/input flow (including slash-command behaviour), and the PTY-backed terminal belong to the embedded TUI; anything added to Ink shows up here automatically. If you are rebuilding the transcript or composer for the dashboard, stop and extend Ink (tui_gateway/AGENTS.md).

Structured React UI around the TUI is fine when it is not a second chat surface. Sidebar widgets, inspectors, summaries, status panels (ChatSidebar, ModelPickerDialog, ToolCall) complement the embedded TUI. Keep their state independent of the PTY child's session and surface their failures non-destructively so the terminal pane keeps working.

dashboard vs serve

dashboard and serve share cmd_dashboard / start_server but are independent surfaces — neither launches the other. serve is the headless backend the desktop app spawns (headless_backend=True: cmd_dashboard skips _build_web_ui and exports HERMES_SERVE_HEADLESS=1 so mount_spa() disables the SPA even if a stray web_dist/ exists — only JSON-RPC/WS/API is reachable). The desktop has no build/runtime dependency on this frontend. Details: apps/desktop/src/AGENTS.md. What each surface (serve, dashboard, webapp) may do is one table, hermes_cli/web_server_surface.py; read it instead of comparing ui_surface strings.

Rules

• Auth: every new REST route and WS endpoint uses the same session token; never a second scheme.
• Routers are one-file-per-surface; a new surface is a new web_routers/<surface>.py, not a growing web_server.py.
• Tests: Python in tests/hermes_cli/ (routers, pty bridge); JS in the web/ vitest suite. Python tests must not assert about package.json / .tsx sources (root testing rules). Root TypeScript style rules apply.