What If AI Coding Agents Worked Like CI Pipelines?

📰 Dev.to AI

Learn how AI coding agents can work like CI pipelines to improve productivity and reduce costs

intermediate Published 6 May 2026

Action Steps

Build a self-hosted orchestrator for AI coding agents using RedQueen
Configure a deterministic state machine to move work through a software development pipeline
Implement a pipeline with spec, code, review, test, and human review stages
Test and refine the pipeline to optimize productivity and reduce token spend
Compare the performance of the new pipeline with traditional AI coding tools

Who Needs to Know This

Developers and DevOps teams can benefit from understanding how AI coding agents can be optimized to work like CI pipelines, improving their overall workflow efficiency

Key Insight

💡 Using a deterministic state machine to orchestrate AI coding agents can eliminate token spend on routing and improve productivity

Key Takeaways

Learn how AI coding agents can work like CI pipelines to improve productivity and reduce costs

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Title: What If AI Coding Agents Worked Like CI Pipelines?

URL Source: https://dev.to/odyth/what-if-ai-coding-agents-worked-like-ci-pipelines-1c7f

Published Time: 2026-05-06T22:10:03Z

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Posted on May 6

# What If AI Coding Agents Worked Like CI Pipelines?

[#programming](https://dev.to/t/programming)[#ai](https://dev.to/t/ai)[#productivity](https://dev.to/t/productivity)[#opensource](https://dev.to/t/opensource)

Most AI coding tools have a weird hidden cost:

They use an LLM to decide what another LLM should do next.

That means you are spending tokens on **routing**, not just on the actual coding.

I built **RedQueen** to flip that model.

## [](https://dev.to/odyth/what-if-ai-coding-agents-worked-like-ci-pipelines-1c7f#what-is-redqueen) What is RedQueen?

RedQueen is an open-source, self-hosted orchestrator for AI coding agents.

Instead of asking an LLM, “what should happen next?”, RedQueen uses a deterministic state machine to move work through a software development pipeline:

```
spec → code → review → test → human review
```

No token spend for orchestration.

No mysterious agent loop.

No “trust me bro” rout

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What If AI Coding Agents Worked Like CI Pipelines?

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