perf(agent-loop): cut 47% of per-conversation function calls via 3 targeted hot-path optimizations (#28866)

* perf(config): add load_config_readonly() fast path for hot agent loop

`load_config()` is called from the agent loop's per-API-call hot path via
`get_provider_request_timeout()` and `get_provider_stale_timeout()` —
both invoked once per turn from `_resolved_api_call_timeout()` in
run_agent.py.

Profiling a synthetic 20-tool-call agent run revealed:
- 21 invocations of `load_config()` cumulating 56ms (~17% of agent loop)
- 34,398 deepcopy calls totaling 37ms (config defensive deepcopy + chain)
- 8,652 `_expand_env_vars` invocations (~412 per turn)

Microbench (cache-hit, real config.yaml present):
  load_config()          265us/call  (125us deepcopy + 140us infra)
  load_config_readonly() 138us/call  (~48% faster)

`load_config_readonly()` returns the cached dict directly without the
defensive deepcopy. Documented contract: caller must not mutate. Returns
plain dict (not MappingProxyType) so downstream `isinstance(x, dict)`
guards keep working — caught during initial implementation when
MappingProxyType broke get_provider_request_timeout's guard logic.

Wired into hermes_cli/timeouts.py (the two functions called per agent
turn). load_config() is unchanged for the 263 other call sites that
mutate the result before save_config(), are not in the hot path, or
where the safety guarantee matters more than the perf.

Profile A/B (cached config, 21-turn agent loop):
                                BEFORE  AFTER   delta
  get_provider_request_timeout  55ms    16ms    -71%
  total function calls          399k    160k    -60%
  deepcopy calls (in hotspots)  34,398  ~0      ~elim

Verified:
- isinstance(load_config_readonly(), dict) is True
- timeout/stale resolutions correct
- load_config() still returns isolated mutable deepcopies
- tests/hermes_cli/test_config*.py / test_timeouts.py: 102/102 pass
- tests/cli/ + tests/agent/test_auxiliary_client.py: 883/883 pass

* perf(redact): substring pre-screens skip non-matching regex chains

Every log record passes through `RedactingFormatter.format` which calls
`redact_sensitive_text`, which historically ran ALL 13 secret-pattern
regexes against every line — including DB connection strings, JWTs,
Discord mentions, Signal phone numbers, etc. — even for typical clean
log records like 'INFO run_agent: API call completed'.

Add cheap substring pre-checks before each regex pass. False positives
still run the regex (which then matches nothing); false negatives are
impossible because every pattern requires the gated substring to match
its leading anchor:

- `_PREFIX_RE`        gated on any of 33 known credential prefix substrings
- `_ENV_ASSIGN_RE`    gated on `=` in text
- `_JSON_FIELD_RE`    gated on `:` and `"` in text
- `_AUTH_HEADER_RE`   gated on `uthorization`/`UTHORIZATION` in text
- `_TELEGRAM_RE`      gated on `:` in text
- `_PRIVATE_KEY_RE`   gated on `BEGIN` and `-----`
- `_DB_CONNSTR_RE`    gated on `://` in text
- `_JWT_RE`           gated on `eyJ` in text
- URL userinfo/query  gated on `://`
- `_redact_form_body` gated on `&` and `=`
- `_DISCORD_MENTION_RE` gated on `<@`
- `_SIGNAL_PHONE_RE`  gated on `+`

Microbench (5 typical log records, 20k iterations each):
                              BEFORE  AFTER  delta
  redact_sensitive_text per call  5.63us  1.79us  -68%

Real-world impact: ~244 log records emitted in a 30-turn agent loop, so
the chain saves ~1ms of CPU per conversation. Bigger win is the
reduction in regex execution and GC pressure during heavy logging
sessions (verbose logging, gateway message processing).

Security regression test: 30 secret-containing inputs (sk-/ghp_/JWT/DB
connstr/Auth-Bearer/private key/URL userinfo/Discord/Signal/etc.)
verified to produce identical redacted output before/after. All 75
existing tests/agent/test_redact.py cases pass.

The `?access_token=foo&code=bar` (bare query string, no scheme) case
that 'leaks' is pre-existing behavior — the URL query redaction
requires a well-formed URL with scheme+host. Not a regression.

* perf(run_agent): cache _needs_thinking_reasoning_pad result per (provider, model, base_url)

Profile of a 31-turn synthetic agent run shows `_needs_thinking_reasoning_pad`
fires 495 times (~16 per turn) and each call ran 3 helper methods, each
hitting `base_url_host_matches` 1-4 times via `urlparse`. Total cost:
3,342 base_url_host_matches calls + 3,373 urlparse calls accounting for
~36ms of agent-loop overhead (~7% of the entire post-network work).

Provider / model / base_url don't change during a conversation except via
`switch_model` and fallback activation — both of which already overwrite
those attributes atomically. Cache the result on a tuple key; since the
key is derived from the very fields that would change, the cache
auto-invalidates on the next read after a switch. No manual invalidation
needed in switch_model / _try_activate_fallback.

Profile A/B (31-turn cached-config agent run):
                                      BEFORE  AFTER  delta
  _needs_thinking_reasoning_pad cum    18ms    1ms    -94%
  _copy_reasoning_content_for_api cum  17ms    1ms    -94%
  base_url_host_matches calls          3,342   372    -89%
  urlparse calls                       3,373   403    -88%
  total function calls                 296k    223k   -25%

Verified:
- tests/run_agent/test_deepseek_reasoning_content_echo.py: 36/36 pass
- tests/run_agent/ (full): 1383/1383 pass + 3 skipped

agent/redact.py

@@ -321,6 +321,15 @@ def redact_sensitive_text(text: str, *, force: bool = False, code_file: bool = F
     patterns when the text is known to be source code (e.g. MAX_TOKENS=***
     constants, "apiKey": "test" fixtures). Prefix patterns, auth headers,
     private keys, DB connstrings, JWTs, and URL secrets are still redacted.
+
+    Performance: each regex pattern is gated behind a cheap substring
+    pre-check (e.g. ``"=" in text`` for ENV assignments, ``"://" in text``
+    for URLs, ``"eyJ" in text`` for JWTs). On a typical hermes log line
+    (no secrets) this drops the 13-pattern scan from ~5.6us to ~1.8us per
+    record (-68%). The pre-checks are conservative — false positives
+    still run the full regex, which then doesn't match. False negatives
+    are impossible because every regex requires the gated substring to
+    match.
     """
     if text is None:
         return None
@@ -331,68 +340,122 @@ def redact_sensitive_text(text: str, *, force: bool = False, code_file: bool = F
     if not (force or _REDACT_ENABLED):
         return text
 
-    # Known prefixes (sk-, ghp_, etc.)
+    # Known prefixes (sk-, ghp_, etc.) — gate on substring presence
-    text = _PREFIX_RE.sub(lambda m: _mask_token(m.group(1)), text)
+    if _has_known_prefix_substring(text):
+        text = _PREFIX_RE.sub(lambda m: _mask_token(m.group(1)), text)
 
     # ENV assignments: OPENAI_API_KEY=***  (skip for code files — false positives)
     if not code_file:
-        def _redact_env(m):
+        if "=" in text:
-            name, quote, value = m.group(1), m.group(2), m.group(3)
+            def _redact_env(m):
-            return f"{name}={quote}{_mask_token(value)}{quote}"
+                name, quote, value = m.group(1), m.group(2), m.group(3)
-        text = _ENV_ASSIGN_RE.sub(_redact_env, text)
+                return f"{name}={quote}{_mask_token(value)}{quote}"
+            text = _ENV_ASSIGN_RE.sub(_redact_env, text)
 
         # JSON fields: "apiKey": "***"  (skip for code files — false positives)
-        def _redact_json(m):
+        if ":" in text and '"' in text:
-            key, value = m.group(1), m.group(2)
+            def _redact_json(m):
-            return f'{key}: "{_mask_token(value)}"'
+                key, value = m.group(1), m.group(2)
-        text = _JSON_FIELD_RE.sub(_redact_json, text)
+                return f'{key}: "{_mask_token(value)}"'
+            text = _JSON_FIELD_RE.sub(_redact_json, text)
 
-    # Authorization headers
+    # Authorization headers — _AUTH_HEADER_RE is "Authorization: Bearer ..."
-    text = _AUTH_HEADER_RE.sub(
+    # case-insensitive, so "uthorization" is the cheapest substring gate that
-        lambda m: m.group(1) + _mask_token(m.group(2)),
+    # covers both "Authorization" and "authorization" without a casefold().
-        text,
+    if "uthorization" in text or "UTHORIZATION" in text:
-    )
+        text = _AUTH_HEADER_RE.sub(
+            lambda m: m.group(1) + _mask_token(m.group(2)),
+            text,
+        )
 
-    # Telegram bot tokens
+    # Telegram bot tokens — pattern requires ":<token>" with digits prefix
-    def _redact_telegram(m):
+    if ":" in text:
-        prefix = m.group(1) or ""
+        def _redact_telegram(m):
-        digits = m.group(2)
+            prefix = m.group(1) or ""
-        return f"{prefix}{digits}:***"
+            digits = m.group(2)
-    text = _TELEGRAM_RE.sub(_redact_telegram, text)
+            return f"{prefix}{digits}:***"
+        text = _TELEGRAM_RE.sub(_redact_telegram, text)
 
     # Private key blocks
-    text = _PRIVATE_KEY_RE.sub("[REDACTED PRIVATE KEY]", text)
+    if "BEGIN" in text and "-----" in text:
+        text = _PRIVATE_KEY_RE.sub("[REDACTED PRIVATE KEY]", text)
 
     # Database connection string passwords
-    text = _DB_CONNSTR_RE.sub(lambda m: f"{m.group(1)}***{m.group(3)}", text)
+    if "://" in text:
+        text = _DB_CONNSTR_RE.sub(lambda m: f"{m.group(1)}***{m.group(3)}", text)
 
     # JWT tokens (eyJ... — base64-encoded JSON headers)
-    text = _JWT_RE.sub(lambda m: _mask_token(m.group(0)), text)
+    if "eyJ" in text:
+        text = _JWT_RE.sub(lambda m: _mask_token(m.group(0)), text)
 
     # URL userinfo (http(s)://user:pass@host) — redact for non-DB schemes.
     # DB schemes are handled above by _DB_CONNSTR_RE.
-    text = _redact_url_userinfo(text)
+    if "://" in text:
+        text = _redact_url_userinfo(text)
 
-    # URL query params containing opaque tokens (?access_token=…&code=…)
+        # URL query params containing opaque tokens (?access_token=…&code=…)
-    text = _redact_url_query_params(text)
+        if "?" in text:
+            text = _redact_url_query_params(text)
 
     # Form-urlencoded bodies (only triggers on clean k=v&k=v inputs).
-    text = _redact_form_body(text)
+    if "&" in text and "=" in text:
+        text = _redact_form_body(text)
 
     # Discord user/role mentions (<@snowflake_id>)
-    text = _DISCORD_MENTION_RE.sub(lambda m: f"<@{'!' if '!' in m.group(0) else ''}***>", text)
+    if "<@" in text:
+        text = _DISCORD_MENTION_RE.sub(lambda m: f"<@{'!' if '!' in m.group(0) else ''}***>", text)
 
     # E.164 phone numbers (Signal, WhatsApp)
-    def _redact_phone(m):
+    if "+" in text:
-        phone = m.group(1)
+        def _redact_phone(m):
-        if len(phone) <= 8:
+            phone = m.group(1)
-            return phone[:2] + "****" + phone[-2:]
+            if len(phone) <= 8:
-        return phone[:4] + "****" + phone[-4:]
+                return phone[:2] + "****" + phone[-2:]
-    text = _SIGNAL_PHONE_RE.sub(_redact_phone, text)
+            return phone[:4] + "****" + phone[-4:]
+        text = _SIGNAL_PHONE_RE.sub(_redact_phone, text)
 
     return text
 
 
+# Substrings used to gate ``_PREFIX_RE`` execution. If none of these appear in
+# the input string, the prefix regex cannot match anything, so we skip it.
+# False positives are fine (they just run the regex, which then matches
+# nothing) — the bound is "no false negatives" and that holds because every
+# pattern in ``_PREFIX_PATTERNS`` has at least one of these as a literal
+# substring of its leading characters.
+#
+# Derived automatically from ``_PREFIX_PATTERNS`` at module load time so a
+# future PR that adds a new prefix to the regex list can't silently break
+# the screen.
+
+def _extract_literal_prefix(pattern: str) -> str:
+    """Return the leading literal characters of a regex pattern.
+
+    Stops at the first regex metacharacter (``[``, ``(``, ``\\``, ``.``,
+    ``?``, ``*``, ``+``, ``|``, ``{``, ``^``, ``$``).  Returns the literal
+    that any match of the pattern MUST contain as a substring, so the
+    pre-screen never produces false negatives.
+    """
+    meta = "[(\\.?*+|{^$"
+    for i, ch in enumerate(pattern):
+        if ch in meta:
+            return pattern[:i]
+    return pattern
+
+
+_PREFIX_SUBSTRINGS = tuple(
+    _extract_literal_prefix(p) for p in _PREFIX_PATTERNS
+)
+
+
+def _has_known_prefix_substring(text: str) -> bool:
+    """Return True if ``text`` contains any known credential prefix substring.
+
+    Used as a cheap pre-check before invoking the expensive ``_PREFIX_RE``.
+    """
+    return any(p in text for p in _PREFIX_SUBSTRINGS)
+
+
 class RedactingFormatter(logging.Formatter):
     """Log formatter that redacts secrets from all log messages."""
 

hermes_cli/config.py

@@ -4331,7 +4331,38 @@ def load_config() -> Dict[str, Any]:
     The cache is keyed on ``str(config_path)`` so profile switches
     (which change ``HERMES_HOME`` and therefore ``get_config_path()``)
     don't collide.
+
+    Read-only callers should use ``load_config_readonly()`` to skip the
+    defensive deepcopy — that path matters in agent-loop hot spots like
+    ``get_provider_request_timeout`` which is called once per API turn.
     """
+    return _load_config_impl(want_deepcopy=True)
+
+
+def load_config_readonly() -> Dict[str, Any]:
+    """Fast-path variant of ``load_config()`` for callers that ONLY READ.
+
+    Returns the cached config dict directly without the defensive deepcopy
+    that ``load_config()`` applies. **Mutating the returned dict (or any
+    nested structure) corrupts the in-process cache for every subsequent
+    caller** — only use this when you are absolutely sure your code path
+    will not write to the result. If you need to mutate or pass to
+    ``save_config``, call ``load_config()`` instead.
+
+    Why this exists: ``load_config()`` cache-hit cost is ~265us per call,
+    half of which (~135us) is the defensive deepcopy. The agent loop calls
+    into config reads (timeouts, thresholds, feature flags) ~20-50x per
+    conversation; skipping deepcopy here removes a measurable allocation
+    source and the GC pressure that comes with it.
+
+    Note: this returns a plain ``dict`` (not ``MappingProxyType``) so
+    existing ``isinstance(x, dict)`` guards downstream keep working. The
+    safety guarantee is purely documented, not enforced — be careful.
+    """
+    return _load_config_impl(want_deepcopy=False)
+
+
+def _load_config_impl(*, want_deepcopy: bool) -> Dict[str, Any]:
     with _CONFIG_LOCK:
         ensure_hermes_home()
         config_path = get_config_path()
@@ -4345,7 +4376,7 @@ def load_config() -> Dict[str, Any]:
 
         cached = _LOAD_CONFIG_CACHE.get(path_key)
         if cached is not None and cache_key is not None and cached[:2] == cache_key:
-            return copy.deepcopy(cached[2])
+            return copy.deepcopy(cached[2]) if want_deepcopy else cached[2]
 
         config = copy.deepcopy(DEFAULT_CONFIG)
 
@@ -4369,9 +4400,24 @@ def load_config() -> Dict[str, Any]:
         expanded = _expand_env_vars(normalized)
         _LAST_EXPANDED_CONFIG_BY_PATH[path_key] = copy.deepcopy(expanded)
         if cache_key is not None:
-            _LOAD_CONFIG_CACHE[path_key] = (cache_key[0], cache_key[1], copy.deepcopy(expanded))
+            # Cache stores a separate deepcopy so subsequent ``load_config()``
+            # (deepcopy=True) callers can mutate freely without affecting the
+            # cached value, and ``load_config_readonly()`` (deepcopy=False)
+            # callers all see the same stable cached object.
+            cached_copy = copy.deepcopy(expanded)
+            _LOAD_CONFIG_CACHE[path_key] = (cache_key[0], cache_key[1], cached_copy)
+            # On the readonly path return the same cached object subsequent
+            # calls will see — keeps "two readonly calls return the same
+            # object" invariant that callers may rely on for identity checks.
+            if not want_deepcopy:
+                return cached_copy
         else:
             _LOAD_CONFIG_CACHE.pop(path_key, None)
+        # First-load result is a fresh dict (not aliased to the cache); safe
+        # to return directly. For the deepcopy=True path this is the
+        # canonical "freshly-built mutable result" the function has always
+        # returned. For the deepcopy=False path with no cache (e.g. config
+        # file missing), it's also fine — callers get an isolated object.
         return expanded
 
 

hermes_cli/timeouts.py

@@ -19,8 +19,8 @@ def get_provider_request_timeout(
         return None
 
     try:
-        from hermes_cli.config import load_config
+        from hermes_cli.config import load_config_readonly
-        config = load_config()
+        config = load_config_readonly()
     except Exception:
         return None
 
@@ -48,8 +48,8 @@ def get_provider_stale_timeout(
         return None
 
     try:
-        from hermes_cli.config import load_config
+        from hermes_cli.config import load_config_readonly
-        config = load_config()
+        config = load_config_readonly()
     except Exception:
         return None
 

run_agent.py

@@ -3607,12 +3607,26 @@ class AIAgent:
         DeepSeek v4 thinking and Kimi / Moonshot thinking both reject replays
         of assistant tool-call messages that omit ``reasoning_content`` (refs
         #15250, #17400). Xiaomi MiMo thinking mode has the same requirement.
+
+        Result cached on the AIAgent instance keyed by (provider, model,
+        base_url); invalidated whenever ``switch_model()`` /
+        ``_try_activate_fallback()`` mutate any of those. This is hot — the
+        agent loop hits ~16 invocations per turn, each of which would
+        otherwise re-run ~5 ``base_url_host_matches`` (and therefore
+        ``urlparse``) calls under it. Caching drops the per-turn cost from
+        ~5us × 16 = ~80us to <1us.
         """
-        return (
+        key = (self.provider, self.model, getattr(self, "_base_url_lower", self.base_url))
+        cached = getattr(self, "_thinking_pad_cache", None)
+        if cached is not None and cached[0] == key:
+            return cached[1]
+        result = (
             self._needs_deepseek_tool_reasoning()
             or self._needs_kimi_tool_reasoning()
             or self._needs_mimo_tool_reasoning()
         )
+        self._thinking_pad_cache = (key, result)
+        return result
 
     def _needs_kimi_tool_reasoning(self) -> bool:
         """Return True when the current provider is Kimi / Moonshot thinking mode.