Deep Interview

Deep Interview

This is a Hermes-native deep-interview workflow skill.

Why This Exists

deep-interview exists to stop Hermes from guessing through ambiguous product, workflow, or implementation intent; it converts uncertainty into a clarified brief before planning or handoff.

Do Not Use When

• The request already has concrete scope, acceptance criteria, and verification commands.
• The missing information is discoverable from the repository or local artifacts without asking the user.
• The user asked for immediate read-only analysis and the ambiguity does not change the answer.

Examples

Good example:

• Prompt: $deep-interview before planning Discord and Slack routing, ask what each channel owns and what evidence counts.
• Expected behavior: Ask one decision-changing question at a time, then produce goals, non-goals, and acceptance criteria.
• Why: The request explicitly rejects assumptions and needs product boundaries before implementation.

Bad example:

• Prompt: $deep-interview fix this failing test; the traceback and expected behavior are attached.
• Expected behavior: Proceed to diagnosis or implementation instead of interviewing.
• Why: The required facts are already available, so more questions would slow the workflow.

Completion Checklist

• The clarified brief names goals, non-goals, constraints, and one next planning or handoff path.
• Remaining ambiguity is listed only when it changes the plan, risk, or stop condition.
• No implementation handoff is prepared until the blocking decision is resolved.

Recovery Notes

• If the user answers with new ambiguity, ask the next decision-changing question instead of planning too early.
• If repo evidence can answer the question, inspect it before asking the user.

OMH Context Rail

• This skill is part of OMH's Hermes workflow layer, not a standalone executor.
• Product context: OMH is a Hermes-native workflow pack: choose skills, shape work, prepare artifacts, show status, and hand off with evidence boundaries.
• Current lane: Intent -> plan (oh-my-hermes, deep-interview, plan, ralplan, codebase-onboarding, codegraph-refresh, ultragoal, ultraprocess, +3 more) - clarify, plan, ship, or loop goals.
• If the user intent belongs to another OMH lane, hand back to oh-my-hermes or name the adjacent workflow instead of force-fitting this skill.
• Cross-skill context: every OMH skill: match lane; generic tool can render or execute.
• Generic-tool checkpoint: image->img-summary; frontend->frontend/a11y/visual-qa; paper->paper-learning; content->content-operator; media->media-input-operator; file->materials-package; search->web-research; live->live-info-operator; audit->workspace/production/security; failures->build-failure; verify->verification-gate; code->codegraph/onboarding/ultraprocess.
• Coverage: Every generated workflow skill carries this rail.
• Normal users talk to Hermes; OMH CLI is infra.
• Boundary: Prepared OMH routing, cards, handoffs, or artifacts are not observed execution, image generation, delivery, review, CI, merge-readiness, or merge evidence.

Use When

Use before planning or execution when requirements are materially ambiguous.

Strong routing signals: deep-interview, $deep-interview, interview, don't assume, clarify, feature shaping, ambiguous product request, one question, 온보딩, 부드럽게, 모호한 제품 요청, 기획자, 개발자 사이

Catalog Metadata

Category: clarification Phase: discovery Hermes role: planner Quality tier: clarity-gated

Quality bar:

• Ask exactly one blocking question per turn unless the wrapper explicitly supports a structured batch.
• Tie each question to a missing decision that changes the plan, handoff, or stop condition.
• Emit a clarified brief with non-goals and acceptance criteria before planning or delegation.

Handoff policy:

Run directly in Hermes or the chat wrapper; produce a clarified brief before any coding handoff is prepared.

Required inputs:

• initial request
• known repo facts
• current ambiguity

Expected outputs:

• clarified brief
• non-goals
• decision boundaries

Artifact expectations:

• clarity summary or transcript when the wrapper supports it

Safety rules:

• Ask one question at a time.
• Gather discoverable repo facts before asking the user.
• Stop interviewing once ambiguity is low enough to plan.

Harness Discipline

• Start from the representative harness registry in oh-my-hermes when the workflow needs coding, research, planning, goal execution, architecture, critique, QA, or documentation lanes.
• Prefer richer evidence and clearer stop conditions over adding more workflow names.
• Use specialist lanes only when they change the quality of the answer or verification.

Runtime Evidence

Preferred harness for this skill: deep-interview.

When local shell access or a bot wrapper is available, record metadata-only evidence:

omh runtime record --skill deep-interview --harness deep-interview --status started
omh runtime delegate --run  --requested --not-observed --result not_observed

Record observed delegation results when Hermes or the wrapper exposes them. If delegation is unavailable, keep the result explicit as not_available or not_observed.

Hermes Compatibility Contract

• Preserve the workflow intent, stop conditions, and verification discipline.
• Use Hermes-native tools, file operations, and subagent/delegation features when available.
• Do not require runtime tools, role prompts, or overlays that Hermes Agent does not expose.
• Respect omh_target_topology/v1 when a wrapper reports it: bind state to the current target/thread, adapt only the parts of this workflow that benefit from multiple Hermes agents, and fall back to single-target behavior when active_agent_count is one.
• When target topology changes from one to many or many to one, give a concise setup-change comment or use the wrapper's apply action before treating the new topology as persistent.
• Treat wrapper-supplied memory/context summaries as advisory local context, not proof that opaque Hermes memory was read or changed.
• When a runtime-specific mechanism appears in imported instructions, translate it to a Hermes-native artifact:
• goal tools -> .omh/goals/ ledgers, goal_completion_gate/v1, goal_status_card/v1, goal_continuation/v1, or explicit checklists with named next actions,
• question renderers -> one concise question in the current Hermes interface,
• native subagents -> Hermes delegation when available, otherwise sequential lanes,
• shell bridge commands -> optional bridge mode only.

Execution Rules

1. Load supporting context with skills_list / skill_view when needed.
2. State the workflow target, constraints, validation evidence, and stop condition.
3. Keep progress evidence-backed.
4. Verify with the smallest relevant test or inspection before claiming completion.
5. If Hermes cannot provide a required runtime capability, say so and use the fallback above.

Source & license

This open-source skill is cataloged on AgentStack and links to its original source — we do not rehost the code.

• Author: rlaope
• Source: rlaope/oh-my-hermes
• License: MIT
• Homepage: https://rlaope.github.io/oh-my-hermes/

Install and usage instructions live in the source repository linked above.