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Zhongwei Li
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skills/dispatching-parallel-agents/SKILL.md
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skills/dispatching-parallel-agents/SKILL.md
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---
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name: dispatching-parallel-agents
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description: Use when facing 3+ independent failures that can be investigated without shared state or dependencies - dispatches multiple Claude agents to investigate and fix independent problems concurrently
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---
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# Dispatching Parallel Agents
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## Overview
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When you have multiple unrelated failures (different test files, different subsystems, different bugs), investigating them sequentially wastes time. Each investigation is independent and can happen in parallel.
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**Core principle:** Dispatch one agent per independent problem domain. Let them work concurrently.
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## When to Use
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```dot
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digraph when_to_use {
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"Multiple failures?" [shape=diamond];
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"Are they independent?" [shape=diamond];
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"Single agent investigates all" [shape=box];
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"One agent per problem domain" [shape=box];
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"Can they work in parallel?" [shape=diamond];
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"Sequential agents" [shape=box];
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"Parallel dispatch" [shape=box];
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"Multiple failures?" -> "Are they independent?" [label="yes"];
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"Are they independent?" -> "Single agent investigates all" [label="no - related"];
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"Are they independent?" -> "Can they work in parallel?" [label="yes"];
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"Can they work in parallel?" -> "Parallel dispatch" [label="yes"];
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"Can they work in parallel?" -> "Sequential agents" [label="no - shared state"];
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}
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```
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**Use when:**
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- 3+ test files failing with different root causes
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- Multiple subsystems broken independently
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- Each problem can be understood without context from others
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- No shared state between investigations
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**Don't use when:**
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- Failures are related (fix one might fix others)
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- Need to understand full system state
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- Agents would interfere with each other
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## The Pattern
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### 1. Identify Independent Domains
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Group failures by what's broken:
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- File A tests: Tool approval flow
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- File B tests: Batch completion behavior
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- File C tests: Abort functionality
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Each domain is independent - fixing tool approval doesn't affect abort tests.
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### 2. Create Focused Agent Tasks
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Each agent gets:
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- **Specific scope:** One test file or subsystem
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- **Clear goal:** Make these tests pass
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- **Constraints:** Don't change other code
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- **Expected output:** Summary of what you found and fixed
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### 3. Dispatch in Parallel
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```typescript
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// In Claude Code / AI environment
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Task("Fix agent-tool-abort.test.ts failures")
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Task("Fix batch-completion-behavior.test.ts failures")
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Task("Fix tool-approval-race-conditions.test.ts failures")
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// All three run concurrently
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```
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### 4. Review and Integrate
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When agents return:
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- Read each summary
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- Verify fixes don't conflict
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- Run full test suite
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- Integrate all changes
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## Agent Prompt Structure
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Good agent prompts are:
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1. **Focused** - One clear problem domain
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2. **Self-contained** - All context needed to understand the problem
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3. **Specific about output** - What should the agent return?
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```markdown
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Fix the 3 failing tests in src/agents/agent-tool-abort.test.ts:
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1. "should abort tool with partial output capture" - expects 'interrupted at' in message
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2. "should handle mixed completed and aborted tools" - fast tool aborted instead of completed
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3. "should properly track pendingToolCount" - expects 3 results but gets 0
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These are timing/race condition issues. Your task:
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1. Read the test file and understand what each test verifies
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2. Identify root cause - timing issues or actual bugs?
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3. Fix by:
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- Replacing arbitrary timeouts with event-based waiting
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- Fixing bugs in abort implementation if found
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- Adjusting test expectations if testing changed behavior
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Do NOT just increase timeouts - find the real issue.
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Return: Summary of what you found and what you fixed.
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```
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## Common Mistakes
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**❌ Too broad:** "Fix all the tests" - agent gets lost
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**✅ Specific:** "Fix agent-tool-abort.test.ts" - focused scope
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**❌ No context:** "Fix the race condition" - agent doesn't know where
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**✅ Context:** Paste the error messages and test names
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**❌ No constraints:** Agent might refactor everything
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**✅ Constraints:** "Do NOT change production code" or "Fix tests only"
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**❌ Vague output:** "Fix it" - you don't know what changed
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**✅ Specific:** "Return summary of root cause and changes"
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## When NOT to Use
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**Related failures:** Fixing one might fix others - investigate together first
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**Need full context:** Understanding requires seeing entire system
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**Exploratory debugging:** You don't know what's broken yet
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**Shared state:** Agents would interfere (editing same files, using same resources)
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## Real Example from Session
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**Scenario:** 6 test failures across 3 files after major refactoring
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**Failures:**
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- agent-tool-abort.test.ts: 3 failures (timing issues)
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- batch-completion-behavior.test.ts: 2 failures (tools not executing)
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- tool-approval-race-conditions.test.ts: 1 failure (execution count = 0)
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**Decision:** Independent domains - abort logic separate from batch completion separate from race conditions
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**Dispatch:**
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```
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Agent 1 → Fix agent-tool-abort.test.ts
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Agent 2 → Fix batch-completion-behavior.test.ts
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Agent 3 → Fix tool-approval-race-conditions.test.ts
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```
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**Results:**
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- Agent 1: Replaced timeouts with event-based waiting
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- Agent 2: Fixed event structure bug (threadId in wrong place)
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- Agent 3: Added wait for async tool execution to complete
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**Integration:** All fixes independent, no conflicts, full suite green
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**Time saved:** 3 problems solved in parallel vs sequentially
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## Key Benefits
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1. **Parallelization** - Multiple investigations happen simultaneously
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2. **Focus** - Each agent has narrow scope, less context to track
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3. **Independence** - Agents don't interfere with each other
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4. **Speed** - 3 problems solved in time of 1
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## Verification
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After agents return:
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1. **Review each summary** - Understand what changed
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2. **Check for conflicts** - Did agents edit same code?
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3. **Run full suite** - Verify all fixes work together
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4. **Spot check** - Agents can make systematic errors
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## Real-World Impact
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From debugging session (2025-10-03):
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- 6 failures across 3 files
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- 3 agents dispatched in parallel
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- All investigations completed concurrently
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- All fixes integrated successfully
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- Zero conflicts between agent changes
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