GitHub - Abil-Shrestha/tracer: Issue tracker for coding agents

2 min read Original article ↗

Tracer

Lightweight issue tracker for AI agents. Tracks dependencies between tasks and coordinates multiple agents working on the same project.

What It Does

  • Track tasks with dependencies (task B blocks task A)
  • Find work that's ready to start (no blockers)
  • Multiple agents can work together and leave comments
  • Git-based storage (JSONL files)

Install

cargo install --git https://github.com/Abil-Shrestha/tracer

Requires Rust toolchain: https://rustup.rs/

Usage

tracer init                                    # Initialize in your project
tracer create "Task name" -p 1 -t feature     # Create issue
tracer ready                                   # See available work
tracer update bd-1 --status in_progress       # Start work
tracer comment bd-1 "Working on this"         # Leave comment
tracer close bd-1                              # Close issue

Multi-Agent Coordination

# Agent 1 starts work
tracer --actor agent-1 update bd-1 --status in_progress
tracer comment bd-1 "Working on auth API"

# Agent 2 sees it
tracer show bd-1  # Shows assignee and comments
tracer comment bd-1 "I'll test it when ready"

# Agent 1 finishes
tracer close bd-1

Auto-assigns agent when status changes to in_progress. Comments show up in tracer show.

Features

  • Dependency tracking (blocks, parent-child, related, discovered-from)
  • Multi-agent coordination via comments and auto-assign
  • JSON output for AI agents (--json flag)
  • Git-friendly storage (JSONL)
  • Auto-discovers database like git does

Commands

tracer create "Title" [-p priority] [-t type]
tracer list [--status STATUS]
tracer show <id>
tracer update <id> --status STATUS
tracer close <id>
tracer comment <id> "message"
tracer dep add <from> <to> --type TYPE
tracer ready
tracer stats

Add --json to any command for JSON output.

Documentation

License

MIT