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Show HN: A local merge queue for parallel Claude Code agents

Summary

Claude Code Merge Queue is a local, zero-cost tool that serializes parallel agent landings to prevent push races and redundant builds. It integrates with Claude Code agents and provides a set of commands for managing lanes, builds, and deployments.

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Show HN: A local merge queue for parallel Claude Code agents
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The local, zero-cost merge queue for parallel Claude Code agents. Several agents land, build, and test at the same time — this serializes it so push races, redundant heavy builds, and shared-resource test flakiness can't happen.

⚡ Quickstart

npm install --save-dev claude-code-merge-queue # or: pnpm add -D / yarn add -D / bun add -d npx claude-code-merge-queue init

Contents

⚙️ Configuration

🆚 vs. GitHub's Merge Queue

🧰 What's in the box

🚨 The emergency hatch

🔍 Know the limits

📄 License

⚙️ Configuration

Everything lives in one file — see examples/claude-code-merge-queue.config.mjs for every field with comments. The short version:

export default { branchPrefix: "lane/", // lane/1, lane/2, ... worktreeSuffix: "-lane-", // ../your-repo-lane-1 portBase: 3000, // lane n gets portBase + n integrationBranch: "main", // where agents land — see below productionBranch: null, // set this for a two-stage model — see below protectedBranches: [], // extra branches beyond the two above; most repos need none regenerableFiles: [], // files a build tool rewrites — never block a rebase on these symlinks: [".env", ".env.local", "node_modules"], buildOutputDirs: ["dist", "build", ".next"], // preview never copies these onto your checkout checkCommand: "npm run check", // what actually gates a landing — see below checksRequired: true, // false = deliberately run with none; see below };

A malformed config (empty branch names, a negative port, productionBranch equal to integrationBranch, ...) fails loud with every problem listed, the moment any command loads it — not a mysterious failure three steps later.

🆚 vs. GitHub's Merge Queue

GitHub Merge Queue Claude Code Merge Queue

Private repo Enterprise Cloud only Any plan, any repo

Cost per landing GitHub Actions minutes, every queue attempt $0 — runs on your own machine

Requires A pull request Nothing — direct rebase + push

Same idea — serialize landings, test before merge, keep history clean — run locally instead of in someone else's billed cloud.

🧰 What's in the box

Command What it does

claude-code-merge-queue hook worktree-create A Claude Code WorktreeCreate hook. Plugs Claude Code Merge Queue's numbered lanes into Claude's native worktree creation.

claude-code-merge-queue build-lock -- Runs — your build — serialized across every lane, machine-wide.

claude-code-merge-queue land Rebases and pushes your lane onto the integration branch through a FIFO queue, so two lanes are never mid-push at once. Agents run this themselves.

claude-code-merge-queue sync Fast-forwards your main checkout so a dev server actually sees what just landed — and re-installs dependencies if the lockfile changed.

claude-code-merge-queue promote Ships the integration branch to production. Human-only — never in an agent's instructions, never automated.

claude-code-merge-queue preview Instantly mirrors a lane's live working tree — uncommitted changes included — onto the main checkout, so you can look at it without a build.

claude-code-merge-queue port Prints a lane's dev-server port, derived from its own directory name.

claude-code-merge-queue prune Removes already-landed sibling lane worktrees on demand.

A pre-push hook makes land non-optional: a direct git push straight to the integration branch is rejected, with the actual command to run instead, and the same hook runs checkCommand before allowing a landing through — no checkCommand configured means every push fails by default. There's a way out for every block (see 🚨 The emergency hatch), but it takes naming the specific branch, not a generic flag.

📝 What init writes

claude-code-merge-queue.config.mjs — integrationBranch and checkCommand auto-detected.

CLAUDE.md (or appends to yours) — tells Claude Code to land its own work once green, without being asked.

.claude/settings.json — the WorktreeCreate hook wired in, without touching anything else already there.

.husky/pre-push — created or appended to, if you already have Husky. If you don't, init tells you rather than silently writing to the untracked .git/hooks/pre-push.

package.json scripts — land, sync, promote, preview, preview:restore, skipping any you've already defined yourself.

claude-code-merge-queue-preflight.mjs — a self-contained safety net that runs before land/sync, so a stale branch fails with a real diagnosis instead of a bare command not found.

🚨 The emergency hatch

Every blocked push — the integration branch, productionBranch, anything in protectedBranches — has a real way through it. One env var, no prompts, no second factor to remember:

CLAUDE_CODE_MERGE_QUEUE_EMERGENCY_PUSH=1 git push origin HEAD:main

This is a convention, not a hard guarantee: it stops mistakes and stray pushes, not an adversarial agent that sets the var itself.

🔍 Know the limits

No human reviews any of this before it lands. checkCommand passing is the only gate — a real test suite and echo ok look identical to this tool. Want a human on every change? This is missing that step on purpose.

Locks are crash-safe by PID liveness, not a timeout. kill -9 anything mid-claim and the next process notices the PID is dead and reclaims it — no stale locks, no timeout to tune.

One machine, not a fleet. The FIFO queue lives in local temp storage — two machines landing at once just get git's ordinary non-fast-forward rejection.

Not a security boundary. Every guardrail here stops mistakes and convention drift, not an adversarial agent — shell access always means git push --no-verify or editing the config on purpose.

A slow checkCommand is a real throughput ceiling. The FIFO lock holds for its entire duration — a 3–4 minute suite caps you well under 20 landings/hour.

Rebase conflicts abort, they never guess. git rebase --abort on any conflict, working tree left clean — CLAUDE.md tells the agent to resolve it and re-run land.

📄 License

MIT. Fork it, rename it, argue with the config shape — that's the point.

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Key points and analysis

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EngineersIntermediate

Key points

  • Serializes agent landings locally to avoid conflicts and redundant builds.
  • Works with any GitHub plan, runs on your own machine.
  • Provides commands for landing, syncing, promoting, and previewing changes.
  • Includes safety mechanisms like pre-push hooks and an emergency hatch.

Highlights and analysis are generated automatically and may contain errors. Check the original source.