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Comment by cube2222 | Hacker News Reader

I agree with you as far as project size for vibe-coding goes - as-in often not even looking at the generated code.

But I have no issues with using Claude Code to write code in larger projects, including adapting to existing patterns, it’s just not vibe coding - I architect the modules, and I know more or less exactly what I want the end result to be. I review all code in detail to make sure it’s precisely what I want. You just have to write good instructions and manage the context well (give it sample code to reference, have agent.md files for guidance, etc.)

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> I know more or less exactly what I want the end result to be

This is key.

And this is also why AI doesn't work that well for me. I don't know yet how I want it to work. Part of the work I do is discovering this, so it can be defined.

I've found this to be the case as well. My typical workflow is:

1. Have the ai come up with an implementation plan based on my requirements

2. Iterate on the implementation plan / tweak as needed, and write it to a markdown file

3. Have it implement the above plan based on the markdown file.

On projects where we split up the task into well defined, smaller tickets, this works pretty well. For larger stuff that is less well defined, I do feel like it's less efficient, but to be fair, I am also less efficient when building this stuff myself. For both humans and robots, smaller, well defined tickets are better for both development and code review.

Yeah, this exactly. And if the AI wanders in confusion during #3, it means the plan isn’t well-defined enough.

There actually is a term for this LLM-assisted coding/engineering. Unfortunately it has been pushed away by the fake influencer & PR term "vibe coding" which conflates coding with unknowledgeable people just jerking the slot machine.

Sounds like so much work just not to write it yourself.

Getting it right definitely takes some time and finesse, but when it works you spend 30 minutes to get 4-24+ hours of code.

And usually that code contains at least one or two insights you would not normally have considered, but that makes perfect sense, given the situation.

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