A Developer's Year-Long Research on AI Agents for Security-Critical Software Development
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Posted by Greg Slepak on July 2, 2026
Summary
A software developer and protocol maintainer shares findings from over a year of research into using AI agents for writing high-quality software in security-critical systems. The author discusses exploring AI agent limits, creating custom AI review tools competitive with multi-billion dollar systems, and maintaining a custom fork of an AI coding agent called Crus. The post focuses on a methodology called "Short Leash AI Coding" for beating the game Fable, emphasizing controlled, security-conscious use of AI in software development.
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Key quotes
· 3 pulledThis post is the culmination of over a year of research into how to properly use AI agents to write high-quality software in security-critical systems.
Over the past year I dove deep into AI agents. I have explored their limits, what they can and cannot be relied upon to do.
I've created our own AI review tools that perform just as well as multi-billion dollar AI-review systems.
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