Here’s How to “Slice” a Redesign the Agentic Way
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A team rebuilding a mobile app's order customization workflow avoided a massive, unwieldy PR by splitting the work into seven vertical slices, each with its own PR that could merge out of order. Three key practices made this work: writing Markdown specs per slice with a 'sequencing note' describing dependencies, predicting merge conflicts in advance and keeping a changelog, and leaving labeled comments in code for handoff points that didn't yet exist. This approach, combined with AI agent assistance, accelerated delivery and simplified testing without requiring sequential merges or painful rebases.
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Use vertical slices instead of horizontal layers.Create written specs per “slice” with a “sequencing note”.Call out merge conflicts beforehand, and keep a changelog.Leave labeled comments for the next slice.Questions this post answers
What is vertical slicing in software development and why is it better than horizontal layering?
Vertical slicing means splitting a feature into thin, end-to-end changes that each touch the real product, rather than dividing work by layer (state, UI, API). Horizontal layering creates a bottleneck because nothing ships until all layers land and still requires an integration step; vertical slices can ship and merge independently, even out of numerical order, as long as they don't secretly depend on each other. Developers structuring parallel feature work can find more workflow breakdowns like this one on daily.dev.
How can I merge pull requests out of order without breaking things when working on a shared feature?
Write a short spec per slice of work that includes a 'sequencing note' stating what the slice assumes already exists and what to do if it doesn't, and explicitly call out expected merge conflicts with a rule like 'whichever slice lands second rebases,' recording the outcome in a changelog. This lets slices with no real dependency on each other, even ones cut from an earlier slice, merge safely and early. Teams juggling parallel branches can browse similar delivery workflow tactics on daily.dev.
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