Tools: How Agents Touch the World
+15 Mana
The Tool Loop: Request, Call, Result, Continue
+15 Mana
Steps in a Single Tool Call Cycle(Sign in required)
Beginner+10 Mana
Tool Categories: Seven Buckets Plus Integrations
+15 Mana
Match Tool to Category(Sign in required)
Intermediate+20 Mana
How the Agent Picks a Tool: Descriptions Matter
+15 Mana
The Role of Tool Descriptions(Sign in required)
Intermediate+20 Mana
What Every Tool Must Declare(Sign in required)
Intermediate+20 Mana
read_file as a Safe Operation
+15 Mana
patch as a Mutating Operation: Trust Boundary Moves
+15 Mana
Tool to Risk Class(Sign in required)
Beginner+10 Mana
The terminal and process Tools: Power and Risk
+15 Mana
Why terminal is the Highest-Risk Built-in Tool(Sign in required)
Intermediate+20 Mana
execute_code vs terminal: Choosing the Lower-Risk Tool
+15 Mana
The Mutating File Tool(Sign in required)
Intermediate+20 Mana
execute_code vs terminal Differences(Sign in required)
Advanced+30 Mana
web_search: For Discovery
+15 Mana
web_extract: For Targeted Pulls
+15 Mana
Match Goal to Web or Media Tool(Sign in required)
Beginner+10 Mana
The Browser Tool: Multi-Backend
+15 Mana
When the Browser Tool Earns Its Overhead(Sign in required)
Intermediate+20 Mana
Media Tools: vision_analyze, image_generate, text_to_speech
+15 Mana
Decision Tree: When Each Web and Media Tool Wins
+15 Mana
When web_extract Beats the Browser(Sign in required)
Intermediate+20 Mana
Why Group Tools? Cognitive Load and Blast Radius
+15 Mana
Toolset Archetypes: Read-Only, Web, Dev, Full
+15 Mana
Match Toolset to Its Contents(Sign in required)
Beginner+10 Mana
Designing Your Own Toolset
+15 Mana
What safe Deliberately Excludes(Sign in required)
Intermediate+20 Mana
Per-Context Activation: Different Surfaces, Different Toolsets
+15 Mana
The Toolsets Config Key(Sign in required)
Intermediate+20 Mana
Toolset Design Principles(Sign in required)
Advanced+30 Mana
Permissions as Defense in Depth
+15 Mana
Per-Surface Restrictions: Different Surfaces, Different Threats
+15 Mana
Match Surface to Recommended Toolset(Sign in required)
Beginner+10 Mana
Approval Gates: Human-in-the-Loop
+15 Mana
When Approval Gates Fire(Sign in required)
Intermediate+20 Mana
Safety Patterns: Composing Restrictions
+15 Mana
Defense-in-Depth Layers in Hermes(Sign in required)
Advanced+30 Mana
The Approval Bypass Flag(Sign in required)
Intermediate+20 Mana
Ready to start Hermes Tools & Capabilities?
21 interactive lessons and 19 hands-on challenges — learn in VS Code, Cursor, or the web.