Switchboard

What it is

Switchboard is a local daemon that gives every coding agent touching a repo the same view of what has been done, what is in flight, and what is active. It is not another agent or a plugin; it is a standalone service with a CLI, a TUI, and an MCP interface that your existing tools consume.

The problem it solves

When two or more AI coding agents work the same repo in parallel, three failures show up daily. Redo loop: agent A lands a fix, agent B re-implements it from scratch. False mark done: an agent declares a task complete while the diff still carries TODO, FIXME, or a stub. Plan drift: the developer pivots, and an hour later an agent quietly reverts to the original plan. Git tracks files, not work intent, and single tool memory lives behind one vendor’s walls.

How it works

Agents read and write a shared work ledger through MCP tools (read_state, claim_work, log_progress, handoff, mark_done). Events are appended to a SQLite log that is SHA-256 hash chained and Ed25519 signed, and any agent can validate the chain. The mark_done call is a contract: it scans the commit diff for unfinished markers (TODO, FIXME, unimplemented, mock, stub), requires test coverage, and rejects the claim if either check fails. Git worktrees, diff risk analysis, and checkpoints round out the workflow.

Where it fits

Switchboard is the coordination layer for multi agent coding. It sits beside the agents (Claude Code, Aider, Cursor) and gives them shared, verifiable memory of intent and progress, the thing git and per tool memory leave out.

Status

Working. The daemon, hash chained and signed event log, mark_done evidence guard, eighteen command CLI, TUI, MCP server, and git worktree management are implemented, with over five hundred tests. The desktop app and parts of the memory system are still early.