Stagent

Product Introduction

1. Definition: Stagent is a state machine plugin for Claude Code, a technical orchestration layer that defines, enforces, and visualizes multi-stage AI development workflows. It is a workflow automation and agentic control system for AI-assisted software engineering.
2. Core Value Proposition: Stagent exists to solve the problem of AI coding agents like Claude Code starting but not reliably finishing complex tasks. It provides a structured framework to drive Claude Code through defined stages (e.g., plan, verify, review, ship), preventing self-approval, incomplete work, and ensuring auditable, resumable execution.

Main Features

1. Defined State Machine Workflow: The core of Stagent is a workflow.json file that acts as a contract. It explicitly declares stages (e.g., planning, executing, reviewing), their transitions, required artifacts, and success criteria. This eliminates implicit behavior and forces the AI agent to follow a deterministic path.
2. Live Session Viewer with SSE: Provides a real-time browser-based dashboard that streams stage changes, artifact updates, and code diffs directly from the Claude Code session using Server-Sent Events (SSE). This enables remote monitoring and collaboration without polling or manual refresh.
3. Portable, Server-Side State Management: Session state is persisted on Stagent's servers, not locally. This allows users to interrupt a workflow on one machine and seamlessly resume it from another using the /stagent:continue --session <id> command, which verifies the repository's root commit before hydrating the session.
4. Customizable & Shareable Workflow Templates: Users can describe a desired workflow in plain English using /stagent:create, and Claude scaffolds the corresponding workflow.json and stage prompts. Templates can be published to a cloud hub (e.g., --flow=cloud://author/name) for community use, such as the included "dev-default" or "ship-it-weekly" templates.
5. Stage-Gated Execution with Hooks: Each stage can be configured with execution agents (e.g., using the "opus" model for a subagent) and "stop hooks." These hooks block session exit until the stage's required artifact is generated with a valid result and matching epoch, enforcing accountability at each step.

Problems Solved

1. Pain Point: Unreliable AI Agent Completion. It directly addresses Claude Code's tendency to self-approve work, patch symptoms instead of root causes, fake Test-Driven Development (TDD), and stop prematurely at "code written" without full verification or deployment readiness.
2. Target Audience: The primary users are software engineers, engineering managers, and DevOps practitioners who use Claude Code for substantial development tasks. Secondary users include technical leads and QA engineers who need visibility into AI-generated code progress and review cycles.
3. Use Cases: Essential for orchestrating multi-step AI development projects such as: building a new application from scratch (e.g., a journaling app), managing a bi-weekly software release train (staging soak, production deployment, postmortem), conducting a research spike with a prototype and final report, or executing a structured design review process.

Unique Advantages

1. Differentiation: Unlike basic Claude Code usage or other AI coding tools that operate in a single, unbounded session, Stagent introduces formal process control. It is not just a chat wrapper but a workflow engine that enforces gates, reviews, and iterations, similar to a CI/CD pipeline for AI agent work.
2. Key Innovation: The combination of a declarative state machine contract (workflow.json) with server-side session portability and a real-time visualizer. This trio ensures the workflow is explicit, interruptible/resumable across environments, and fully transparent, which is unique in the AI-assisted development tooling space.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

1. How does Stagent integrate with Claude Code? Stagent is installed as a plugin via the Claude CLI. Once installed, you use commands like /stagent:start within a Claude Code session to initiate a workflow, seamlessly taking control of the session's progression through the defined stages.
2. Can I create my own custom workflows in Stagent? Yes, you can describe a workflow in natural language using the /stagent:create command. Stagent will generate the technical workflow.json configuration and stage prompts for you. You can also fork and modify existing templates from the public cookbook.
3. Is my code secure when using Stagent's cloud session state? Stagent's server stores session metadata, state, and artifacts to enable portability. The plugin verifies your local repository's root commit upon resuming to ensure integrity. Your actual codebase remains on your local machine or connected version control system.
4. What happens if a stage (like "review") fails in a Stagent workflow? The state machine contract defines the failure transition. For example, in the default workflow, a "FAIL" in the reviewing stage transitions the workflow back to the "executing" stage for a new attempt (epoch), creating a formal feedback loop until quality gates are passed.
5. Do I need to keep my terminal open to watch a Stagent workflow run? No, that's a key benefit. Once a workflow starts, you can open the provided live viewer URL (https://stagent…/s/<id>) in any browser to stream progress in real-time. You can close the terminal, and the server-side session will continue to track state.