I'm looking for advice on leveraging AI to help me create a detailed plan for an app, rather than just coding it. My past attempts have led to only high-level development steps, which isn't enough for me. I want guidance on breaking down larger goals into smaller, manageable tasks to build a minimum viable product, and then gradually enhance it into the final vision for my project. Essentially, I want to use AI to streamline my planning process without relying on it for the actual coding. Are there specific AI prompts that have worked for you when planning a project? Any tips on how to effectively break projects down into manageable steps would also be appreciated. For context, I tend to jump into projects and end up overwhelmed trying to perfect everything from the beginning. I often feel like I could use some guidance to keep me focused on just completing the essential tasks before refining everything else.
3 Answers
The tools and methods you're exploring sound promising! Just to clarify, when using AI tools in environments like VSCode, do you usually need a subscription for the specific AI agents you choose to use?
One approach that works for me is to treat the AI like a tough project manager who's focused on saving resources. Instead of asking for a step-by-step plan all at once, I recommend breaking it down. Start by presenting all your ideas and ask the AI to "Identify the 3 core features that are absolutely necessary and cut out everything else." It gets better at honing in on what’s essential this way. You might also try asking for a "Definition of Done" for each task, which outlines just the minimum functionality required for it to be considered complete.
Have you come across spec-driven development? It's a method of guiding AI models that might be helpful, even if you plan to implement the tasks yourself. You can check out the spec-kit repository on GitHub, which offers a command line interface to work with various coding agents. There’s also a tutorial from the repo maintainer that explains the concept in more detail.
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