A sidecar for Hermes
she stands at the gate.
A little server you run yourself. It proves every Discord request is genuine, hands it to the right tool, and never touches your main app.
$ uvicorn aphrodite.app:create_app --factory --host 127.0.0.1 --port 9079
INFO: Uvicorn running on http://127.0.0.1:9079
$ curl -fsS http://127.0.0.1:9079/health
{"status": "ok"}Built with
FastAPI Uvicorn PyNaCl Discord MCP Python 3.10+Why you'd want it
Putting your own tool on Discord means real backend plumbing: proving requests are genuine, sending them to the right place, keeping strangers out, and knowing it still works. Get one piece wrong and anyone can poke your bot. Aphrodite is all of that, already done right, so you can stay on the fun part.
Doing it yourself
With Aphrodite
How it connects
Hermes uses Aphrodite, not the other way around. You talk to Hermes; it hands the gnarly parts — checking Discord, routing, tools — to Aphrodite, and Aphrodite hands the results straight back. It runs as a separate sidecar, so your Hermes code never changes.
Aphrodite handles Discord · routing · tools · health
Features
Three small jobs, each one easy to follow. No mystery backend, no surprises.
Every incoming request is signature-checked, so strangers can't trigger your bot. There's also a no-signature test mode for trying things out on your own machine.
Tap a button or run a command and Aphrodite works out which of your tools should handle it, then sends it there, with no tangled if-statements to maintain.
Simple health and status checks, plus a doctor command that flags anything missing, so launching is boring, in the good way.
Modules
Aphrodite ships with a small native set of tools. Adding your own is one command and a name — no forking, no patching the core.
image_gen Generate pictures from a prompt — through one dispatch call or the /image/generate route. It plugs into your assistant's sign-in for the image model, so there's no extra key to manage.
Bundled · on by default
skillopt Kick off optimization runs, compare diffs, score evaluations, and read it all back in a built-in review page. Self-contained — it only needs a little local storage.
Bundled · on by default
acp_relay Bridges a multi-turn chat to an external agent and remembers the thread between turns, so each message just adds to the conversation instead of starting over.
Bundled · on by default
Bring your own
One command scaffolds a ready-to-edit package. Aphrodite finds it through a standard entry point, so you just list its name in APHRODITE_MODULES and it's live. Every module answers calls shaped system:v1:action, and an unknown name gets a safe placeholder instead of crashing startup.
$ aphrodite new-module my_module$ pip install -e my_module$ export APHRODITE_MODULES=my_module$ aphrodite modules$ aphrodite dispatch-test my_module:v1:pingInstall
If you can paste a line into a terminal, you can run it. All you need is Python 3.10+. It pulls in everything else.
$ pip install "git+https://github.com/<org>/aphrodite"$ pip install "aphrodite-sidecar[mcp,acp] @ git+https://github.com/<org>/aphrodite"$ git clone https://github.com/<org>/aphrodite && cd aphrodite$ python -m venv .venv && . .venv/bin/activate$ pip install .$ pip install -e ".[dev]"$ uvicorn aphrodite.app:create_app --factory --host 127.0.0.1 --port 9079$ curl -fsS http://127.0.0.1:9079/health$ curl -fsS http://127.0.0.1:9079/statusMCP
Turn on the optional MCP server and Aphrodite hands your tools to AI assistants like Claude. Install the mcp extra, point your assistant at it, and everything stays on your machine and easy to inspect.
$ pip install "aphrodite-sidecar[mcp] @ git+https://github.com/<org>/aphrodite"$ python -m aphrodite.mcp_server{
"mcpServers": {
"aphrodite": {
"command": "/path/to/.venv/bin/python",
"args": ["-m", "aphrodite.mcp_server"]
}
}
}Your main app stays untouched, you stay in control, and it all runs on a machine you trust.
