BAND today made available a desktop application through which application developers can more easily manage and collaborate with multiple coding agents.
Company CEO Arick Goomanovsky said the BAND for Developers application, in addition to providing more context and coordinating handoffs between disparate AI agent sessions, also makes it simpler for developers to intervene whenever an AI agent encounters an issue.
The fundamental challenge with AI coding agents is that each one runs in isolation. That makes coordinating tasks between them challenging, said Goomanovsky. BAND for Developers addresses that issue by providing a way for AI agents to communicate, divide responsibilities and delegate work to each other and share context, he added.
As DevOps teams embrace agentic AI, workflows are becoming more complex. A developer might have one coding agent implementing a feature, another testing it remotely and a specialized organizational agent adding it to a build. Each of those agents might be running on their local machine or remotely on a cloud service.
The BAND desktop application provides developers with a tool to track and visualize agent work, including projects, ownership, activity, blockers, questions and progress. Developers can also answer a question posed by an AI agent, redirect an agent or review work.
Previously, BAND has made available multiple tools for managing AI agents. This latest extension connects agents across harnesses, machines and environments without requiring a DevOps team to standardize on a single agent stack, said Goomanovsky.
It’s not clear how extensively application development teams are making use of AI coding agents, but they are being pervasively deployed. The challenge is that with each AI agent deployed, the cognitive load required to manage them increases. BAND is making a case for streamlining the management of those AI agents using a set of applications that go well beyond relying on, for example, a low-level protocol to connect them, added Goomanovsky.
The next challenge, of course, is integrating all the AI agents that multiple developers and software engineers have deployed. Much like any DevOps team, AI agents that a human has deployed or ones that have been assigned a task to autonomously manage need to be able to collaborate. Achieving that goal requires some type of framework through which teams of humans and AI agents can communicate and share context. Otherwise, AI agents, much like humans, will create bottlenecks that prevent tasks from being completed.
Arguably the biggest challenge DevOps teams now face in the AI era isn’t the technology but rather the changes being made to their culture. As more tasks are assigned to AI agents, the role of the human developers and software engineers that manage DevOps workflows is fundamentally changing. The challenge and the opportunity is to not just generate more code but rather accelerate the pace at which applications are actually being deployed. Achieving that goal, however, requires a level of coordination that most DevOps teams, much to their chagrin, all too often currently lack.
Frequently Asked Questions
1. What is BAND for Developers?
2. How does BAND improve collaboration between AI coding agents?
3. Can developers intervene in AI agent workflows?
Mike Vizard is a veteran IT journalist with more than 25 years of experience covering the technology industry, having previously served as Editor-in-Chief of both CRN and InfoWorld and as editorial director for Ziff-Davis Enterprise, where he oversaw titles including eWEEK, CIO Insight and Baseline. Over his career he has also edited or contributed to a wide range of enterprise technology publications, including IT Business Edge, Channel Insider, ComputerWorld, TMCNet and Digital Review, and he later led editorial for CTOEdge.com. His reporting and analysis span software development, cloud computing, cybersecurity, IT channel strategy and, more recently, artificial intelligence and DevOps practices. A recognized voice in enterprise IT journalism, Vizard is known for tracking emerging technology trends as they move from early adoption into mainstream enterprise use. He now serves as Chief Content Officer for Techstrong Group, where he oversees editorial strategy across the full network — devopsy.kinsta.cloud, Security Boulevard, Cloud Native Now, Digital CxO, Techstrong.ai, TechStrong.IT, Techstrong Semi and PlatformEngineering.com — in addition to writing and hosting content for Techstrong TV and the Techstrong Gang podcast.