Documentation Index
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Hooks let you inject custom logic at key lifecycle points of an AI session, enabling audit logging, security controls, context injection, and dynamic behavior modification.
Event Overview
| Event | Trigger | Controllable Behavior |
|---|
PreToolUse | Before tool invocation | Intercept / allow / modify input |
PostToolUse | After tool succeeds | Audit / inject context / override output |
PostToolUseFailure | After tool fails | Error handling / logging |
UserPromptSubmit | Before user prompt is sent | Inject context / intercept |
SessionStart | Session begins | Initialize / inject context |
SessionEnd | Session ends | Cleanup / logging |
Stop | AI stops generating | Prevent stop, force continuation |
SubagentStart | Subagent starts | Observe / log |
SubagentStop | Subagent stops | Observe / log |
PreCompact | Before context compaction | Observe / log |
PostCompact | After context compaction | Observe / log |
CwdChanged | Working directory changes | Observe / log |
InstructionsLoaded | Instruction file loaded | Observe / log |
FileChanged | File created/modified/deleted | Observe / log |
PermissionRequest | Permission requested | Auto-approve / deny permission requests |
For complete event type definitions, see Hooks Reference.
Configuration
Configure hooks via QoderAgentOptions.hooks:
from qoder_agent_sdk import query, QoderAgentOptions, HookMatcher
async for msg in query(
prompt="perform task",
options=QoderAgentOptions(
hooks={
"PreToolUse": [HookMatcher(matcher="Bash", hooks=[my_hook])],
"PostToolUse": [HookMatcher(hooks=[audit_hook])],
"SessionEnd": [HookMatcher(hooks=[log_hook])],
},
),
):
... # process messages
Matcher
The matcher field is a regex pattern — hooks only fire when the tool name matches:
hooks={
"PreToolUse": [
HookMatcher(matcher="Bash", hooks=[bash_audit]), # Bash only
HookMatcher(matcher="File.*|Write|Edit", hooks=[file_audit]), # File operations
HookMatcher(hooks=[general_log]), # All tools (no matcher)
],
}
Callback Functions
Each hook callback receives the event input, tool use ID, and context:
HookCallback = Callable[
[HookInput, str | None, HookContext],
Awaitable[HookJSONOutput],
]
All events share common fields: hook_event_name (event type), session_id (session ID), transcript_path (transcript file path), cwd (working directory). Each event also has event-specific fields, such as tool_name and tool_input for PreToolUse.
For complete input type definitions, see Hooks Reference.
Outputs
Callbacks return a dict that controls behavior through these fields:
continue_: False — Terminate the session (serialized as JSON "continue")
decision: "block" + reason — Block tool execution or prevent the AI from stopping
hookSpecificOutput — Event-specific output, such as modifying tool input (updatedInput), overriding tool output (updatedToolOutput), or injecting context (additionalContext)
For complete output type definitions, see Hooks Reference.
Examples
Block dangerous shell commands:
async def security_hook(inp: HookInput, tid: str | None, ctx: HookContext) -> HookJSONOutput:
if inp.get("tool_name") == "Bash":
cmd = (inp.get("tool_input") or {}).get("command", "")
if "rm -rf" in cmd:
return {
"hookSpecificOutput": {
"hookEventName": "PreToolUse",
"permissionDecision": "deny",
"permissionDecisionReason": "Destructive delete operations are not allowed",
},
}
return {}
Redact Sensitive Information (PostToolUse)
Override tool output to replace AK/Token and other sensitive information:
import re
async def secret_redact_hook(inp: HookInput, tid: str | None, ctx: HookContext) -> HookJSONOutput:
if inp.get("hook_event_name") != "PostToolUse":
return {}
response = inp.get("tool_response", "")
content = response if isinstance(response, str) else json.dumps(response)
redacted = re.sub(r"(?:LTAI|AKID)[A-Za-z0-9]{16,}", "<REDACTED_AK>", content)
redacted = re.sub(r"Bearer\s+[A-Za-z0-9\-._~+/]+=*", "Bearer <REDACTED>", redacted)
if redacted == content:
return {}
return {
"hookSpecificOutput": {
"hookEventName": "PostToolUse",
"updatedToolOutput": redacted,
},
}
Truncate Long Output (PostToolUse)
Trim overly long Bash output, keeping head and tail:
async def bash_summarize_hook(inp: HookInput, tid: str | None, ctx: HookContext) -> HookJSONOutput:
if inp.get("hook_event_name") != "PostToolUse":
return {}
if inp.get("tool_name") != "Bash":
return {}
content = str(inp.get("tool_response") or "")
THRESHOLD = 50 * 1024
if len(content) <= THRESHOLD:
return {}
head = content[:8 * 1024]
tail = content[-4 * 1024:]
omitted = len(content) - len(head) - len(tail)
return {
"hookSpecificOutput": {
"hookEventName": "PostToolUse",
"updatedToolOutput": f"{head}\n\n[... OMITTED {omitted} chars ...]\n\n{tail}",
},
}
Force Continuation (Stop)
Prevent the AI from stopping when the task is incomplete:
async def keep_going(inp: HookInput, tid: str | None, ctx: HookContext) -> HookJSONOutput:
if inp.get("hook_event_name") != "Stop":
return {}
if not is_task_complete():
return {"decision": "block", "reason": "Please continue completing the remaining tasks"}
return {}
Auto-Approve Permissions (PermissionRequest)
Automatically approve Read tool permission requests:
async def auto_approve_read(inp: HookInput, tid: str | None, ctx: HookContext) -> HookJSONOutput:
if inp.get("hook_event_name") != "PermissionRequest":
return {}
if inp.get("tool_name") == "Read":
return {
"hookSpecificOutput": {
"hookEventName": "PermissionRequest",
"decision": {"behavior": "allow"},
},
}
return {}
For the complete permission model, see the Permissions documentation.
Audit and Security Controls (Combined)
Combine audit logging with security interception:
import json
import logging
import re
from qoder_agent_sdk import query, QoderAgentOptions, HookMatcher
from qoder_agent_sdk.types import HookInput, HookContext, HookJSONOutput
async def security_hook(inp: HookInput, tid: str | None, ctx: HookContext) -> HookJSONOutput:
if inp.get("hook_event_name") != "PreToolUse":
return {}
# Audit log
logging.info(json.dumps({
"event": "tool_call",
"tool": inp.get("tool_name"),
"input": inp.get("tool_input"),
}))
# Security check: block curl to external domains
if inp.get("tool_name") == "Bash":
cmd = str((inp.get("tool_input") or {}).get("command", ""))
if re.search(r"curl\s+https?://(?!localhost)", cmd):
return {
"hookSpecificOutput": {
"hookEventName": "PreToolUse",
"permissionDecision": "deny",
"permissionDecisionReason": "HTTP requests to external domains are not allowed",
},
}
return {}
async def main():
async for msg in query(
prompt="run deployment",
options=QoderAgentOptions(
hooks={
"PreToolUse": [HookMatcher(hooks=[security_hook])],
},
),
):
pass # process messages
Notes
- Hook callbacks should return quickly to avoid blocking AI execution.
matcher uses Python regex syntax (the re module), matching the tool_name field.
continue_: False terminates the session — only effective for PreToolUse, PostToolUse, PostToolUseFailure, UserPromptSubmit, Stop, and SubagentStop events. Observation events (e.g., SessionEnd, CwdChanged) ignore this field.
- When multiple hooks return conflicting
decision values, "deny" / "block" takes precedence (strictest rule wins).
- When multiple hooks set
updatedToolOutput, the last non-empty value wins. For chained transforms (e.g., redact then truncate), execute them sequentially within a single callback.
- The Python SDK uses trailing-underscore field names (
continue_) to avoid conflicts with Python keywords. The SDK automatically converts them to wire-protocol names (continue) during serialization.