I also use Plan Mode. How does it otherwise work if I am not even quite sure what exactly I want to build myself?

intrasight 18 hours ago | parent | next [-]

> if I am not even quite sure what exactly I want to build myself

Sounded to me like you need a plan.

My approach is to take the statement of work or problem definition and iterate on that myself until I'm really clear on what is the goal. I therefore have a good some good ideas about what the plan should be.

If extending an existing application, which is usually the case, then make use of the plan documents that I had written before AI arrived on the scene. These sre documents in markdown form that say step-by-step how to, for example, add a new report to the system.

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int_19h 20 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

You tell it, "let's brainstorm, don't implement anything yet". Then you talk about what you want to build and hammer out all the corner cases. Then you tell it "now do that".

	▲	nunez 12 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I have something like this in my default rules which Claude has consistently always loaded before doing any work. Works really well!

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loeg 20 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

> How does it otherwise work if I am not even quite sure what exactly I want to build myself?

It makes some plausible choices and you can retroactively ask it to make different ones later, if you want.

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matsemann 18 hours ago | parent [-]

My experience with that is not very good. It gets so hung up in its initial decision. Like, it won't make changes because they're "breaking", for something never even committed. Or it will litter the code base with defensive code and comments about the path not chosen.

	▲	qvq 10 hours ago \| parent \| next [-]
		This is my experience as well. Changing the initial decision is a hassle so I just start over most of the time.
	▲	loeg 11 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		> My experience with that is not very good. It gets so hung up in its initial decision. Like, it won't make changes because they're "breaking", for something never even committed. This hasn't been my experience. > Or it will litter the code base with defensive code and comments about the path not chosen. I've definitely seen this, though.