Skip to content

docs(config): document auxiliary.<task>.fallback_chain in config reference #47396

New issue

Have a question about this project? Sign up for a free GitHub account to open an issue and contact its maintainers and the community.

Sign up for GitHub

By clicking “Sign up for GitHub”, you agree to our terms of service and privacy statement. We’ll occasionally send you account related emails.

Already on GitHub? Sign in to your account

Closed
joyjit wants to merge 1 commit into from
Closed

docs(config): document auxiliary.<task>.fallback_chain in config reference #47396

Changes from all commits
Commits
Show all changes
1 commit
Select commit
File filter

Filter by extension

Filter by extension
Conversations
Failed to load comments.
Loading
Jump to
Jump to file
Failed to load files.
Loading
Diff view
Diff view
29 changes: 29 additions & 0 deletions website/docs/user-guide/configuration.md
View file
Open in desktop
Original file line number Diff line number Diff line change
Expand Up @@ -958,6 +958,7 @@ auxiliary:
api_key: "" # API key for base_url (falls back to OPENAI_API_KEY)
timeout: 120 # seconds — LLM API call timeout; vision payloads need generous timeout
download_timeout: 30 # seconds — image HTTP download; increase for slow connections
fallback_chain: [] # backup providers tried if this task's provider hits a capacity error

# Web page summarization + browser page text extraction
web_extract:
Expand Down Expand Up @@ -1024,6 +1025,34 @@ Each auxiliary task has a configurable `timeout` (in seconds). Defaults: vision
Context compression has its own `compression:` block for thresholds and an `auxiliary.compression:` block for model/provider settings — see [Context Compression](#context-compression) above. The primary fallback chain uses a top-level `fallback_providers:` list — see [Fallback Providers](/integrations/providers#fallback-providers). All three follow the same provider/model/base_url pattern.
:::

### Per-task fallback chain (`auxiliary.<task>.fallback_chain`)

Any auxiliary task can carry its own `fallback_chain` — an ordered list of
backup providers Hermes tries when the task's primary provider hits a
**capacity error** (HTTP 402 payment required, daily/monthly quota
exhaustion, or a connection failure). Each entry needs at least `provider`;
`model`, `base_url`, and `api_key` are optional. The provider that just
failed is skipped automatically.

```yaml
auxiliary:
compression:
provider: anthropic # primary: compress on Anthropic Haiku
model: claude-haiku-4-5-20251001
fallback_chain:
- provider: openrouter # tried first if Anthropic is out of capacity
model: anthropic/claude-haiku-4-5
- provider: gmi # then GMI Cloud
model: moonshotai/Kimi-K2-Instruct
```

The chain sits in the middle of the auxiliary fallback ladder: primary
provider → your `fallback_chain` → main agent provider/model → warn and
re-raise. Transient HTTP 429 rate limits (with `Retry-After`) respect your
explicit provider choice and do **not** trigger the chain. For the full
ladder and trigger rules, see
[Fallback Providers → Auxiliary Task Fallback](/integrations/providers#fallback-providers).

### OpenRouter routing & Pareto Code for auxiliary tasks

When an auxiliary task resolves to OpenRouter (either explicitly or via `provider: "main"` while your main agent is on OpenRouter), the main agent's `provider_routing` and `openrouter.min_coding_score` settings **do not propagate** — by design, each auxiliary task is independent. To set OpenRouter provider preferences or use the [Pareto Code router](/integrations/providers#openrouter-pareto-code-router) for a specific aux task, set them per-task via `extra_body`:
Expand Down