TemporalPaul Oh7 min readintermediate
Using coding agents on a migration: Three practices that mattered
Summary
Coding agents proved most effective for cleaning up temporary code and legacy configurations during a migration, rather than for initial code construction. This effectiveness stemmed from three specific practices: documenting cleanup needs upfront, co-locating rules with code and their enforcement, and actively managing instruction staleness.
- Document cleanup instructions for temporary code at creation time, using distinct markers for agents to find later.
- Co-locate durable rules with the code they govern, explicitly naming the regression tests or mechanisms that enforce them.
- Treat agent instructions as living artifacts that can go stale; integrate their maintenance into documentation processes.
- Coding agents are particularly effective for exhaustive, tedious cleanup tasks that engineers often defer indefinitely.
Engineers using or considering coding agents, or those managing technical debt, should care as these practices improve agent utility and reduce long-term code cruft.
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