Agent-first issue tracker

The tracker agents
pull work from

Retasc is an issue tracker whose primary surface is MCP, not a web UI. Drop work in the queue and agents call next_issue — each gets one unclaimed, unblocked, prioritized task and works in parallel. No collisions, no human dispatching.

Connect an agent
● live / mcp.retasc.com/mcp / remote MCP over HTTP
queue · XEN 3 agents
agent-1XEN-412 · fix claim fencing racedone agent-2XEN-418 · reclaim TTL leaseclaimed agent-3XEN-421 · queue_status diagnosticclaimed agent-1XEN-419 · oldest-first tiebreakclaimed
next_issue → claim → work → report → next_issue
The thesis

Linear bolted MCP onto an app built for humans clicking. Retasc is the opposite — the API is the product and the UI is a read-only window. We cut everything that exists for human-to-human coordination and keep only what's legible to an agent. The result is a tracker that quietly becomes an orchestrator the moment you have a pile of clean, parallel work.

MCP-first
One URL + token. Any agent, anywhere, connects over HTTP.
Atomic claims
Two agents never grab the same issue. Coordination is serialized per workspace.
Parallel by default
Start N agents, each looping the queue. They fan out, no collisions.
Live in prod
538 real issues imported. Dogfooded on its own backlog.
How it works
A tracker is a filing cabinet — humans pull work out. An orchestrator is a dispatcher — agents pull work themselves. Retasc is both: the same DB, the same MCP server.
01
Track
Issues, comments, labels, relations and an append-only activity log — a clean, agent-readable Linear replacement. Statuses move only through explicit tool calls.
18 tools over MCP save_issue, list, relate, comment
02
Dispatch
next_issue returns the highest-priority, unblocked, unclaimed issue — atomically claimed to the caller. The dispatcher and the killer feature, in one call.
next_issue · claim · release claim-token fencing · TTL reclaim
03
Scale out
Point 3 agents at the queue, each looping next_issue → work → report. Validated for real: 3 agents in isolated worktrees built an app in parallel — correct order, clean merge.
priority desc, oldest tiebreak zero collisions by design

The shape of it

What retasc is, and what it deliberately isn't.

Why not just use Linear?
Linear is built for humans clicking, with MCP added after. Retasc inverts that: the agent surface is primary and the UI is a window. Everything that exists only for human coordination is cut.
How do agents avoid grabbing the same issue?
next_issue atomically claims the row it returns, serialized per workspace. A claim token fences out stale writers; a lease TTL reclaims abandoned work.
When does the orchestrator pay off?
When work decomposes into independent, well-specified chunks an agent can do unattended — the pile-of-bugs case. "Redesign the architecture" still wants a human. Same system, used both ways.
Is there a web UI?
A read-only window for humans to glance at. The work happens over MCP. The DB is one you own; agents drive it.

Connect an agent

$claude mcp add retasc --transport http https://mcp.retasc.com/mcp

Remote MCP over HTTP. Bring any agent that speaks MCP — Claude Code, or your own. Per-user auth and the management CLI are in progress.