Seen on a MacBook (M5 Pro, 2026-11-12), in a real Claude Code session: the lead started a
Pi worker and an OpenCode worker on the local model in ITS OWN case, sent both their tasks
at once, and reported afterwards that one written answer was lost. Both prompts had named
the same file, codeman-answer-<token>.md, and the second worker's summary replaced the
first one's. The code the workers wrote was not affected.
The token was the second plus $RANDOM. Claude Code runs zsh on a Mac, and zsh hands every
subshell the same $RANDOM until the parent shell reads it (measured there: four subshells,
one number, where bash drew four). The token line is itself a subshell, so under zsh the
"random" part never changed, and two calls in one second shared a token. Workers in their
own cases never noticed: same name, different folders, and the marker is matched per pane.
The token now ends in six characters of the worker's id. The test makes $RANDOM a plain
variable that always reads the same, which is what zsh does, and runs two calls at once.
The reference gets one sentence for hand-built markers in a fan-out.
No new preamble version: 1.51.0 is not released yet.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5.2 <noreply@anthropic.com>
dsh-TUI 0.19.0 opens a setup guide ("Step 1 of 4") in every session
until a person has finished it once, and the guide's cursor is the same
glyph the skill waits for as the composer: the readiness mark matched on
it in 2 of 2 launches. An Enter there acts on the highlighted step,
which is a sign-in. A spawned worker was handed back "ready" on that
screen, and the first task prompt would have been typed into it.
After the mark, the rendered pane is now read once: a worker that shows
the guide is deleted and the spawn fails with what to do (finish the
guide once from the Run menu). For `local:deepseek` and for a plain
`deepseek` worker alike.
Also says which verb reads a local DeepSeek worker's answer: `sendmark`.
The harness reports the end of a turn, but dsh 0.2.2 renamed its
transcript file and Codeman reads an empty answer from it for now.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5.2 <noreply@anthropic.com>
`spawn_worker <name> local` started the one agent the model was
installed with. The server now lists every agent the model can be run
with, so the skill passes the choice on:
- `local_model` adds `agents` (each with its status, whether it is the
default, and the readiness mark the server measured) and `models`
(what is on the Mac; only the active one runs). A new reason,
`no-agent`: installed, but nothing that can run the model is there.
- `spawn_worker <name> local:<cli>` (`local:pi`, `local:deepseek`,
`local:opencode`, `local:claude`, also as `name:local:pi` in
`spawn_workers`) starts an agent whose status is `ready`. Anything
else fails the spawn before a session exists and names the agents
that are startable. No agent is ever installed from here: that stays
a person's click in the window. A Codeman that lists no agents knows
one, and only that one can be named.
- The readiness mark comes from the server when it names one, else from
what this skill measured (OpenCode `┃`, Pi `extended-keys`), and
`LOCAL_READY_MARK` overrides both.
- A Pi worker on the local model is started with
`piConfig.approveProjectTrust: false` (--no-approve). On a custom
model Pi keeps no home, so it asks to trust the folder in every
session with Trust preselected, and the task prompt's Enter would
answer that.
Pi's mark is the last line of its startup, a warning about tmux's
`extended-keys` option. Its composer rule is painted in the first frame,
before Pi takes Enter: a prompt sent at the rule stayed unsent, 2 of 2,
and one sent at the warning was submitted, 4 of 4 (pi 1.5.2, Linux). It
is a side effect, not a contract, so a Pi that stops printing it fails
the spawn and the worker is deleted, never handed back on a guess.
The preamble changed, so CODEMAN_PREAMBLE moves to 1.51.0 in the
preamble, the SKILL.md copy of it and every version check, and the
plugin mirror is synced.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5.2 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Measured on opencode 1.3.0 in a private tmux socket, with a fake
OpenAI-compatible endpoint streaming the reply a character or two at a
time: the marker was on the screen, but the stripped client stream read
D, spinner, O, spinner, N, ... because opencode redraws its spinner
between the streamed pieces, so wait-output never matched it. sendmark
then waited its whole timeout and answered 2 for a reply that had
finished, with the answer file already written (opencode's write tool
wrote it without asking).
The marker wait now runs in rounds of at most 10 s, and between rounds
the answer file is a way out too: a non-empty regular file whose
checksum held still for one round is read, with matched false. The
marker stays the fast path. The answer-file wait after a marker no
longer spins when the exit wait gets no answer, and treats an ended
wait as the worker gone.
The same run measured the readiness mark: with a fresh home and a
custom provider, the first composer bar came with the composer and a
prompt pasted with its Enter at that moment was submitted, so the docs
say so instead of "not measured". The example keeps its input in a
subfolder, apart from the case's CLAUDE.md.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
The codeman skill's preamble learns the model Codeman installs on this Mac:
- local_model asks GET /api/v1/local-model and prints one JSON line: the
installed model, the coding agent that runs it and its endpoint, or the
reason there is none (not a Mac, nothing installed, an unfinished
install, a blocked install, admin only, a server without the routes).
Exit 0 only when a worker can start now or after a runtime start.
- spawn_worker <name> local (and name:local in spawn_workers) starts a
stopped runtime the way the window's Start button does, quick-starts the
installed agent with customModel, and waits for its composer (OpenCode's
bar, the claude path for a claude agent, LOCAL_READY_MARK otherwise). A
confirmation question from quick-start fails the spawn with empty stdout;
nothing is ever confirmed on the person's behalf.
- sendmark <sid> <prompt> drives any agent worker without an end-of-turn
signal: the exactly-once input body, a split marker through wait-output,
then the answer read back from a file the worker wrote in its folder
(regular files only, 256 KB at most), with one exit code per outcome.
The preamble stamp moves to 1.50.0 so every cached copy is rewritten.
The tests run the real preamble against a stubbed server.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Codeman maintainer