Agent session HOME points to wrong path — tools look in hermes profile instead of user's actual home

Problem

When Hermes Agent starts a session, the HOME environment variable is set to the hermes profile directory (e.g. ~/.hermes/profiles/<profile>/home). Many tools and CLIs resolve ~ to $HOME at runtime, causing them to look for user credentials, configs, and state in the wrong directory.

This results in:

• Azure CLI: ~/.azure/ is empty in the session, real credentials at ~/.azure/ are ignored. Every az command fails with "run az login" even when the user is authenticated in their normal shell.
• Git credentials: ~/.gitconfig and SSH keys at ~/.ssh/ are invisible to git operations running in the session.
• Python packages: Installed to the wrong site-packages path.
• npm/node: Global packages installed in the wrong node_modules location.
• Any tool that stores state under ~: Looks in the hermes profile instead of the user's actual home.

Concrete example

Root cause

The session's HOME is the hermes profile dir. The user's actual home is not available as $HOME or any other env var — it must be hardcoded as an absolute path. This breaks the standard pattern of ~/.configfile which most CLI tools use.

Impact

• Every CLI tool that stores user credentials or config under ~ needs special handling.
• The agent repeatedly forgets this and tries to use ~/.azure/ etc, finds empty files, and reports "not logged in" even when the user is authenticated.
• The user has to repeat authentication in every new session because the tokens aren't written to the session's HOME.

Proposed solutions

Option A: Symlink the session HOME to the real home

Create ~/.hermes/profiles/<profile>/home as a symlink to the user's real home directory.

Pros: Zero changes to tool invocations. Everything just works. Cons: May expose the user's full home directory tree to the agent's working environment.

Option B: Set an explicit env var for the real home

Set REAL_HOME=<actual-user-home> in the session environment.

Pros: Clear separation. Cons: Requires the agent to remember to use ${REAL_HOME} instead of ~. Easy to forget.

Option C: Override HOME via environment in tool wrappers

Pass HOME=<actual-user-home> when spawning tools, while keeping the agent's own HOME at the profile dir.

Pros: Tool behavior corrects without changing agent behavior. Cons: Agent itself still uses wrong home internally.

Recommendation

Option A (symlink) — simplest and most correct.

Notes

• This issue has appeared in multiple contexts: Azure CLI auth, git credentials, npm global packages, and Python tooling.
• The user has confirmed this is a recurring pattern of confusion in sessions.
• The fix should be implemented at the session/environment bootstrap level, not per-tool.