What

Register /start as a slash command and add a handler. Without this, /start falls through to the generic "unknown command" notice, which breaks standard Telegram bot first-contact UX (every bot must respond to /start).

Why

Every Telegram bot receives /start as the mandatory first message from a new user. hermes-agent already recognizes /sethome, /status, /help, etc. but not /start — so first-contact responses feel broken and users are unclear whether the bot is alive. Discovered during a production Hermes-Quant deploy.

Changes

• hermes_cli/commands.py: add one CommandDef("start", …, "Session", gateway_only=True) entry to COMMAND_REGISTRY so /start is recognized everywhere the registry feeds (GATEWAY_KNOWN_COMMANDS, help text, Telegram BotCommands menu, Slack subcommand mapping, etc.).
• gateway/run.py:
  • Dispatch: if canonical == "start": return await self._handle_start_command(event) next to the /sethome dispatch.
  • New async method _handle_start_command(self, event: MessageEvent) -> str that:
    1. Returns a markdown welcome listing /sethome, /status, /help.
    2. Reads the current home channel from ~/.hermes/config.yaml (same key /sethome writes to: {PLATFORM}_HOME_CHANNEL); falls back to the process environment.
    3. If no home is set → prompts the user to run /sethome.
    4. If a home is set but the user is in a different chat → acknowledges the bot is active and points to the existing home.
    5. If the user is in the home channel → confirms that.

Idempotent; safe to invoke any time.

Tests

Direct-call smoke covered all three code paths of the handler.

Live Telegram round-trip on a production gateway verified all five scenarios:

• /start from the home channel → correct "this chat is home" response.
• /start from a different chat → correct "home is already set elsewhere" response.
• /start with no home set → correct "run /sethome to receive digests" prompt.
• /help still works (unchanged upstream handler).
• /status still works (unchanged upstream handler).
• /sethome in a different chat correctly reassigns + reverts cleanly.

Import smoke:

• from hermes_cli.commands import COMMAND_REGISTRY, GATEWAY_KNOWN_COMMANDS; 'start' in GATEWAY_KNOWN_COMMANDS → True
• import gateway.run compiles clean (Python 3.11)

Downstream status

Our production deploy will run on canonical upstream and accept the "unknown command" reply for /start until this merges. Documented as a known issue pointing at this PR.

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