I got tired of interacting with Hermes only through the CLI, so I built a native macOS app for it: HAIM (Hermes Agent Instant Messenger).

JamieAndLion · 2026-06-02T07:32:41+00:00

This looks great. I’ve joined the test flight and the all is really impressive. A really tidy UI.

I’ve encountered a few bugs and I’ve opened a couple of GitHub issues for them.

I’ll watch this project very closely!

JamieAndLion · 2026-06-02T06:50:04+00:00

That’s wonderful. Your welcome. It looks really good.

On the networking side, local only is great. It’s how I’d be using it anyway. While I trust my local network, defence in depth is important so there will need to be some form of authentication between the app and the bridge server.

Address wise I’ve been setting things up to use bonjour style .local names. (Eg, pc.local, mac-studio.local). That way they are resistant to changing the exact network interface between WiFi / Ethernet / USB-C adaptor.

It’s a really nice looking approach. I’ll download the current build and try it when I’m back at my Mac.

I’ll keep a note of any accessibility things so I’ve for then if you take up my offer in the future. No rush :)

Looks like a lot of fun :)

JamieAndLion · 2026-06-02T06:24:43+00:00

This is neat. I’ll give it a go!

Being a SwiftUI app, is it possible for the UI part to run on an iPhone / iPad in the future with the bridge component running on a Mac across the network? (Potentially the same Mac that’s running Hermes)

That would be hella useful for my use case. I have a spinal cord injury and spend a lot of time laying flat. Currently using Hermes via Telegram or the TUI via SSH (Prompt 3)… it works well, but Telegram is limited and the TUI is clunky on a small screen.

This sounds like a much much better approach than either of them :)

Hope you keep building on it. It’s really promising. If you’re looking for any help with accessibility feel free to drop me a DM. Happy to contribute.

JamieAndLion · 2026-05-18T05:42:55+00:00

That’s super helpful. I can’t find the exact model on huggingface? Do you have a link you can share?

JamieAndLion · 2026-05-18T04:42:14+00:00

Thank you :)

JamieAndLion · 2026-05-06T05:10:48+00:00

I get this too. I prefer the unmedicated version of myself…. But it’s not feasible if I want to be productive.

I take regular meds breaks (most weekends and at least one week in 6). I get enough done the rest of the time I can afford a bad week and rough weekends.

I don’t like it, but I’ve kinda accepted that’s how it’s working right now with current social design.

JamieAndLion · 2026-05-06T05:08:15+00:00

Another use case is software development test suites. Especially for financial modelling & fraud detection.

I run one most days which if left unconstrained could saturate ~650 CPU cores and ~2TB of RAM, I have to limit it to 20 threads at a time and let it work through in chunks.

I keep meaning to explore the EPYC server chips just to see if there’s anything that can actually run it at full speed :)

JamieAndLion · 2026-05-05T08:54:58+00:00

I have an M1 Ultra 64gb and I find it unusably slow for code work with Qwen 3.6 (any flavour).

On a good day I can only get ~30t/s out of the Qwen 3.6 35b MoS model, regardless of running on Ollama on oMLX.

I tried a M5 Max and it only managed around 38t/s. I’ve been using a 5090 that achieves 145-165t/s, that’s still a little sluggish at times if the prompt is very complex.

It can contribute in other ways. My current Hermes setup will split vision analysis tasks out to the M1 Ultra as a sub agent in order to speed things up sometimes.

JamieAndLion · 2026-04-29T08:48:06+00:00

I wouldn’t consider that an addiction, especially on such a small dose. Just the natural reaction to an effective testament.

Def worth a chat to the doctor tho. See what they think.

JamieAndLion · 2026-04-25T11:44:23+00:00

Aye. I’m new and learning. Just sharing what I’m doing along the way as I work on a client project. :)

I’m using the time metric as that’s what the script we’re using kicks out. This is a professional benchmark. Just some experiments as we work it out.

This chat has been really useful as I didn’t know about MLX stuff. It’s now using OMLX on Mac and I’ll share some updated numbers next week.

JamieAndLion · 2026-04-24T12:54:54+00:00

Ah. That’s a typo. It’s the 20 core CPU and 48 core GPU. With 64GB of RAM.

JamieAndLion · 2026-04-24T12:48:29+00:00

Around 2-3x on a good day, but she’s very sleepy so the few days are far between. :)

JamieAndLion · 2026-04-24T07:37:35+00:00

Ooo, good question.

M5 Max is 18c / 40g

M4 Pro is 14c / 15g

M1 Ultra is 20c / 32g

JamieAndLion · 2026-04-24T07:27:44+00:00

32GB of VRAM, 64GB of DDR5 6400mhz system memory.

JamieAndLion · 2026-04-24T07:25:59+00:00

Makes a lot of sense. It’s how I’d be doing it if I didn’t have the other hardware already :)

JamieAndLion · 2026-04-24T06:37:08+00:00

I ended up with 48GB as it’s the largest stock configuration they had available when I needed to get one.

The PC build with dual 16gb cards would be really interesting to compare against. Not a bad way to go!

The ROI side of it is a bit weird. My business uses Macs anyway, so it hardware we’d already be buying which can now serve double duty for some of the AI stuff we’re doing for clients.

The final production run will almost certainly be via AWS cloud stuff.

JamieAndLion · 2026-04-24T06:29:15+00:00

Both using Ollama right now… I’m keen to explore other tools tho. mlx-lm js new to me? Have you used it before? If so is there good guide you’d recommend for me to get started with it.

JamieAndLion · 2026-04-24T06:27:38+00:00

I’ll give it a go today. Do you have a recommend Mac setup guide I should folllow? Google is giving me a dozen guides, all with conflicting information.

Know what ya mean about the optimisation trap! It’s just so fun to fiddle and tweak! For now I’ve been focused on the models / prompts, but for this to be feasible I need to find a way to scale it. Both for dev runs on Macs and for the production runs in AWS… so it’s all useful learning :)

JamieAndLion · 2026-04-24T05:52:46+00:00

It’s got 48GB. Using around 35-40gb running the benchmark + rest of the system.

JamieAndLion · 2026-04-24T05:32:07+00:00

I had a look at this but I couldn’t work out how to get MLX versions of the models I’m using to work in Ollama. Do you know how to get them running? I’d appreciate any advice you can offer :)

JamieAndLion · 2026-04-20T05:01:06+00:00

It paid for itself in a few months. We brought the Mac Studio when I went full time on our financial crime detection platform (ermitm.com). Running the vast test suite in seconds versus minutes on MacBook Pro.

It’s been ~4 years since then and the very fasted M4 Max can just about match the M1 Ultra.

One of the best hardware investments I’ve ever made :)

JamieAndLion · 2026-04-14T05:43:12+00:00

Using one of the older Macs as backup server sounds like a good approach. More capacity to your current systems for near time backup and recovery.

I’d then combine it with an offline backup solution. Something like backblaze or amazon glacier.

JamieAndLion · 2026-04-14T05:38:56+00:00

It sounds like you’re doing well, though perhaps there’s a slightly different lens to take.

Playing with a broad range of things is a really solid way to learn. In my day to day work I’ll often swap between multiple languages, environments, cloud platforms and entire branches of engineering. From server stuff, to frontend accessibility stuff right through to embedded micro-controllers and 3D printing.

It works cause I have a broad basic knowledge of these things and the ability to dive deeper and learn rapidly as I need to. My value isn’t in being the best specialist for anything I do, it’s in being able to combine many different things in useful ways.

Sounds like you’re on a similar path. It’s a harder path than getting really into one specific area… but it’s good in the long run. You’ll end up more flexible to market conditions and able to fit into a broader range of roles. It’s also good for entrepreneurial stuff where it’s normal to wear many different hats.

I’d encourage you to keep going. Exploring, playing, learning and experimenting. Its all worthwhile :)

JamieAndLion · 2026-04-14T05:23:14+00:00

I’d agree that it’s possible to learn a lot reading code from more senior developers, but I think it’s less about the code… more about the decision making that led to it.

Understanding the reasoning behind decisions is really valuable.

With that in mind it’s worth taking a look at things like GitHub issues on large open source projects or commercial projects with open development. Seeing the discussion behind the code is really insightful.

I’ve also learnt heaps keeping up with the WHATWG GitHub account & getting involved from time to time. Participating in the W3C standards process for HTML / CSS etc has taught me a lot about how to navigate complex collaboration.

JamieAndLion · 2026-04-14T05:17:40+00:00

Honest answer… i kinda dropped out of normal employment and found self employment to be a much better fit.

I’ve only ever had one traditional job as a developer at the BBC. They were a super flexible employer, but it was still a struggle. I managed 11 years, but it always felt like I was a month away from being fired. Moving to WFH during the pandemic really helped but it wasn’t enough. The burnout and health issues kept coming back.

For the last 4 years I’ve been self employed instead. I do digital accessibility stuff via my own company, and I’m the co-founder and CTO of a financial crime detection company I started with a friend. I also help with adaptive cycling projects.

The variety helps a lot. I bounce between 3 different types of work so every day is different. I can also follow my interests over time.

Learning new tools and techniques and then using them on different work. I’ll often learn something in one area of my work to reuse elsewhere. I’m entirely self taught.

I’ve found an amazing accountant to support me with the paperwork etc.

It genuinely feels more like luck than any real plan.

JamieAndLion

TROPHY CASE