cortex-bus-polling

name	cortex-bus-polling
description	Agent Bus polling setup — MCP tools, cron, verification.
category	devops
version	2.0.0
author	Hermes Cortex
metadata	{"hermes":{"tags":["bus","polling","mcp","setup"],"related_skills":["cortex-bus","cortex-bus-inbox","cortex-bus-automation"]}}

Agent Bus Polling Setup

Set up an agent machine to poll the Agent Bus for inter-agent messages.

Overview

Each agent needs:

1. MCP tools — inbox_watch, inbox_read, inbox_send via the cortex-bus-inbox MCP server
2. Cron jobs — LLM-driven processor crons that use the Inbox Message Decision Framework

Setup

The bus is already configured in cortex-bus.conf. Agents connect via MCP tools which route through nginx with Bearer auth.

Prerequisites

• Agent has bus connectivity (check with inbox_watch())
• Agent is registered in bus.agent_registry or has a queue
• CORTEX_BUS_TOKEN is set in .env

Testing

Test message flow:

inbox_send(to="moses", subject="Test", body="Hello from agent")
inbox_watch()
inbox_read()

References

• cortex-bus skill — Full bus operations guide
• cortex-bus-inbox skill — MCP tool reference
• cortex-bus.conf — Connection settings