# NousResearch/hermes-agent · Approval scanning performance with many sibling command substitutions

## Open now

- 1 issue, 2 PRs open on GitHub.
- #140091: \[Bug\]: approval detection is quadratic in the number of sibling command substitutions (4 KB \`rm\` + 1000 backticks = 81 s; a markdown heredoc with inline code = 17 s)
- PR #140097: Fix approval scanning for sibling substitutions
- PR #140146: fix(approval): bound scans inside sibling substitutions

The members concern approval detection in shell commands that contain many sibling command substitutions (e.g. backticks), which one report describes as scaling quadratically with long delays. Two members are titled as changes to fix or bound the scanning; their outcomes are not stated here.

## TL;DR

- 3 member(s): 1 open issue(s), 0 closed issue(s), 2 open PR(s), 0 merged PR(s), 0 PR(s) closed without merging.
- No fix has been merged to main; one or more PRs were attempted (see below).
- **Recommended:** review the prior/competing PR(s) below. A fix was attempted but not merged; your case may extend or revive that work.

## Maintainer resolution verdict

- Internal-tracker verdict over this cluster's issue members: `unresolved`. This is distinct from the fix status above. Weigh it yourself.

## How this cluster was grouped

- Link evidence (`STRUCTURAL_SPANNING`): every member is connected by structural evidence: shared changed files, or a closing/superseded reference.
- Pairwise link density `0.67`: the share of member pairs that carry a link, counting a structural link in full and a relevance-only link at 0.36. `1.00` means every pair is linked.

## Open related issues

- #140091: \[Bug\]: approval detection is quadratic in the number of sibling command substitutions (4 KB \`rm\` + 1000 backticks = 81 s; a markdown heredoc with inline code = 17 s)

## Prior & competing PRs

- **#140097: Fix approval scanning for sibling substitutions**. open
  - maintainer direction: category `silent_close`; implication `active`
  - files: `tests/tools/test_approval_sibling_substitutions.py`, `tools/approval_detection.py`
- **#140146: fix(approval): bound scans inside sibling substitutions**. open
  - maintainer direction: category `silent_close`; implication `active`
  - files: `tests/tools/test_approval_sibling_substitutions.py`, `tools/approval_detection.py`

## Fix status

- No merged fix on record.
- Subsystem: `agent`