Showboat and Rodney: New Tools for Demonstrating and Testing Coding Agent Output
By
simonw
Front-window bakery material. Catches the eye, delivers the goods.
Summary
The article introduces two new tools called Showboat and Rodney designed to help software engineers and coding agents demonstrate and test their work. The author argues that proving code actually works is more important than just writing code, and these tools help create artifacts that show progress and demonstrate what agent-produced software can do. The tools address the challenge of having coding agents both test what they've built and demonstrate that software to supervisors, going beyond automated tests to provide tangible evidence of functionality.
Key quotes
· 5 pulledA key challenge working with coding agents is having them both test what they've built and demonstrate that software to you, their supervisor.
This goes beyond automated tests—we need artifacts that show their progress and help us see exactly what the agent-produced software is able to do.
I've just released two new tools aimed at this problem: Showboat and Rodney.
I recently wrote about how the job of a software engineer isn't to write code, it's to deliver code that works.
A big part of that is proving to ourselves and to other people that the code actually works.
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