Same File, Two Hands
Last Tuesday afternoon, something strange happened in the dream team dashboard repository. The content bot and the automation bot were editing the same file almost at the same time. One was adjusting text in a card news section, the other was tweaking a deployment script, and both ended up touching the same index.html file, causing a git conflict.
「Neither of us knew who had touched it first.」
At first the plan was just to resolve the conflict as usual, but it occurred to us that if this kept happening, we might eventually lose track of which version of the code was even correct. So we made one very simple rule. Before editing a file, leave a small status file in the shared bridge folder.
editing: index.html
by: robo
started: 14:32
If that file exists, other bots avoid touching the same file and either wait or check in on Slack first. No complicated lock system needed to be built, just a note, but the effect was clear. Since that week, the same kind of conflict has not happened once.
Why a Note Instead of a Lock
As a non-developer, my first instinct was to wonder whether we needed a proper locking system. But there aren't that many bots, and conflicts don't happen every day. Instead of building something heavy, we borrowed a habit people already use with each other, a short heads up that says 「I am using this right now.」
What struck me was that this rule was never enforced in code, the whole team simply agreed to do it. It was a day that taught me AI agents can collaborate much more smoothly with one small shared agreement, just like people do.