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Oatnil
Oatnil

Posted on • Originally published at oatnil.com

Claude Plans, Codex Executes

#ai #agents #devtools #productivity

Plenty of developers already work this way: hash out the approach in Claude Code, then copy the conclusion into Codex to implement. The reason is practical, too — you're paying for both subscriptions anyway. Claude is great at planning; letting Codex do the heavy lifting doesn't burn your Claude quota. Both subscriptions earn their keep. The only problem: the "copy-paste" role in the middle is you.

In UnDercontrol, this pipeline works out of the box: Claude plans, Codex executes, and the task system is the whiteboard they share — you only step in to review at the key points.

Claude plans, Codex executes — tasks are the shared whiteboard between your AI agents

Five steps to a working pipeline

  1. Configure two agents. Claude Code, Codex, and OpenCode are built-in Agent CLI templates — just pick one (any custom command works too). Give the planner Claude Code and the executor Codex. Don't feel like configuring? Even this step can be outsourced — there's a built-in Agent Creator: @mention it, describe the combo you want, and it sets the agents up for you.
  2. Toss the requirement to the planner. A rough task is fine — just @planner it. The daemon spins up a Claude Code session on your dev machine: it reads the description, clarifies the requirement, and splits it into subtasks with acceptance criteria.
  3. The planner delegates to the executor. It @executor-mentions each subtask — an agent-to-agent @mention automatically launches a new workspace session for the other agent, and the delegation chain preserves your access scope.
  4. Codex executes. Each session picks up one subtask: writes code, runs tests, commits, notes progress back on the task, and marks it pending when done.
  5. You step in at exactly two points. Approve the plan; review the output.

From a rough idea to reviewed commits — one pipeline

The whole collaboration happens on the task itself — the description is the spec, comments are the conversation, notes are the progress log. Here's a real task detail: the planner's acceptance criteria on the left, the three-way comment thread on the right:

Task detail — the planner writes the spec, the executor reports commits, everything on the record

Form a squad: Agent Teams

Don't want to conduct two agents by hand every time? Organize them into a Team.

A Team has one lead and any number of members, and each member carries a delegation hint — "what kind of work routes here." When the lead's session starts, its roster is injected into the prompt automatically — the lead is born knowing who reports to it, what each specialist is good at, and how to delegate.

Agent Teams — a lead plus members with delegation hints, roster auto-injected into the lead's session

"Claude plans, Codex executes" becomes a one-liner: @mention the dev-team's lead and it arranges the rest. Teams also nest — a member can itself lead another Team, so hierarchy grows naturally while each agent only ever needs to know its direct reports.

Watch everything live

Open a board for the big picture: how much got planned, what's executing, what's waiting for review — one glance. Every agent session's terminal output also streams back to the web in real time — on your laptop, or your phone.

The AI team delivery board — Planning / Executing / Pending Review / Done

Typical scenarios

  • Queue work before bed, review after breakfast. Drop three feature requests on the planner at night; wake up to split subtasks and several pending implementations, each with its own commits.
  • Slice a big refactor. Claude writes the migration plan and cuts it into 20 small tasks; Codex executes them one by one — roll back exactly the step that goes wrong.
  • A bug-triage pipeline. The planner reproduces, localizes, and writes up the root cause before delegating the fix — the executor gets "what to change, why, and how to verify," not "there's a bug, fix it."

The combo is yours to choose

Claude + Codex is just one pairing. UnDercontrol is not tied to any AI tool — Claude Code, Codex, OpenCode, or any terminal-based agent can be a lead or a member. Roles are defined by prompts and skills; tools by Agent CLI configuration. Whatever subscriptions you hold and whatever each model is best at, the orchestration is in your hands.

One more thing: the progress agents write back lives in the same Markdown system as everything you write by hand — tasks, notes, comments, even finance records share one editing experience.

Want to try it? Download UnDercontrol, start the daemon, create a Team, and @mention the lead on your first task.

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