u/Overall-Classroom227

i built this for exactly one reason. my screenshots folder had thousands of files all named Screenshot 2026-something and i could never find a single one.

so one evening i vibecoded a tiny thing that looks at each screenshot, reads what's actually in it, and renames it to something human. receipt-uber-march.png. slack-argument-about-tabs.png.

took maybe two evenings. most of that was me arguing with the model about file permissions, not the actual logic.

i posted it in a random discord thinking three people might care. a couple hundred folks have run it now and i keep getting emails asking can it do this for my downloads folder too. i did not plan for a downloads folder. i am learning what scope creep feels like from the inside.

the part that surprised me was that the boring problem was the good problem. i wasn't trying to build a startup, i just wanted to find one file, and it turns out a lot of people have the exact same tiny annoyance.

what's the most pointless thing you built for yourself that other people ended up wanting?

Lately it feels like everyone building SaaS is using Cursor, Claude, Copilot, or something similar.

Is that actually true, or are there still plenty of people building the old-fashioned way?

Genuinely curious what your workflow looks like these days

I'll try to be concise, haha, so as not to be a load of nonsense, but simply to provide you with value, just like this site has provided me!

I have an agency, and I've been doing SEO for my website for a year and a half, without really managing to boost my traffic.

But three months ago, one thing was a game changer! I discovered SEOclaim, a blog that compiles all of Google's statements on various topics.

And it's in these statements that the value is enormous and the details are hidden to make a difference on your site. I learned a lot, especially about statements on link building and 404 pages. All of this was a game changer.

And for those who are going to ask me about the title, haha, it's because with all these changes, I increased my traffic by about 300 visits per month, which generated 10 appointments that turned into clients ;)

So I was one of those who are really late adopters of LLMs for coding; I am a sole developer of a codebase in the company I worked for (Angular)- a maintainer, rarely new features are added - no hard deadlines, a very very relaxed job , so I was away from the picture how other devs work in the industry now ; and sometimes I take side jobs of all kinds of stacks (I am fullstack); most often Nodejs/NestJs + React/Next + Postgres or Mongo; but my last side project was early 2025 - I took a long break from them.

I won't lie, I did use GPT and Copilot at times; but mostly to autocomplete boring stuff (ie. mock data, enums..etc). Yet I kept seeing posts on dev reddits that one doesn't have to full adopt the more powerful tools such as Claude Code / Codex.

I recently joined a side project with a team; so it's my first time since almost 1 years and 7 months.

WTH happened to this industry???!

Ok, the things I discovered:

- Deadlines now are 10x craziers; it's IMPOSSIBLE to finish anything manually. These deadlines force you to rely on Claude Code / Codex; there's no other way, Agile is meaningless now; it's just pump and ship

- All other members are heavily using LLM, frontend, DBA, AI....everyone.

- Claims I encounred on reddit posts that "Ok coding is automated but 'System design' and architecture are now more important than anything else" ? A LIE - everyone is using LLMs even for System design; I have seen entire achitecture documenation all generated by LLM, even this part is automated now.

- It is impossible to do PR reviews now when each PR is like ...a lot of thouands of lines; even PR reviwers are using copilot to review.

SO what part is left in this industry that is not automated?? NOTHING!! iT'S ALL AI AI AI!

And spec gathering is one person's job, often the tech lead, so please don't tell me it's this one, it doesn't require a team.

Someone posted a chat app here recently and thought I would poke around a little. Within 30 minutes I was able to completely break the app.

I am redacting the domain and sensitive data.

The app works. The UI is fine. There are more features than you would expect from a weekend project, from the outside it looks like a finished app but when you look under the hood not so much...

Just about everything that could be wrong was wrong.

• Exposed OpenAI private key in public javascript bundle
• Firebase config fully public
• localStorage used for identity management
• Admin and report data readable without access controls
• Ban system not verified by backend

Firebase was the biggest issue. The database rules were wide open. Anyone could read and modify all chat rooms (There are private rooms that should require a password), reported users, admin logs, user stats, ban lists, etc.

I was able to adjust my user rank but also can modify the data of any other user in the app. (Falsify messages, derank, change username, etc)

The ban system is entirely ineffective, it uses a localStorage device ID, someone could just change the value themselves or clear cache and cookies and evade a ban.

Common problems:

• Exposed API keys in frontend
• Firebase/Supabase with improper permissions
• Trusting browser and device state
• Trusting localStorage for identity
• Client side admin checks
• Client side moderation checks
• User roles, ranks, credits, or balances stored in writable records
• Private data hidden in the UI but readable through the backend

If you are building these apps, please check this before you ship:

• Search your deployed JavaScript for sk_, sk-, OPENAI, SECRET, TOKEN, and PRIVATE. There should be no private keys exposed in the frontend.
• Test your Firebase or Supabase permissions while logged out.
• Try reading your database directly from a terminal.
• Make sure admin-only paths are protected by backend rules, not just hidden buttons.
• Do not trust localStorage as proof of identity.
• Do not let users directly write their own role, rank, balance, message count, or subscription status.

AI tools can help you build fast. That part is real. But if the app touches users, money, moderation, private rooms, admin panels, or anything people care about, it needs a security pass before it goes live.

Hey all — I've been using Claude for coding and want to get better at using it specifically for web/frontend design (layout, typography, overall aesthetic, not just functional code).

Curious what's been working for people:
- Any custom "skills" or prompt setups you've built or installed?
- Specific workflows for going from a rough idea to a polished-looking UI?
- Tips for getting Claude to avoid generic/templated-looking designs?
- Any tools or plugins you pair with it (Figma, Tailwind, component libraries, etc.)?

Would love to hear what's actually worked for you, especially if you've found ways to get more distinctive/less "AI-default" looking results. Thanks!

Omg you still have to use your brain and wear a million hats from PM, product designer, content designer. qa tester, web designer (coz you gotta get that website up with the right marketing message that explains your app), graphic designer (coz you gotta get some nice pics ready for the App Store) etc. etc.

I wouldnt dare add developer to the list because omg, I have sooo much respect and now understand why they make the big bucks. Who can do a job for something that doesn’t work or has the ability to wrong at any point in the chain, just chasing for that one time stuff works or works in cohesion. Omg you really have to be built for that coz it sure ain’t easy. I mean I enjoy solving puzzles lol but that’s a whole other level and I was just getting frustrated from writing prompts lol so I can’t imagine.

What was hilarious was that even the Ai got stuck and packed me off to discord for an answer from a human. At that point I was like every tech CEO needs to vibe code an app so they can get it. That thing literally has 0 memory too.

Anyway was a fantastic, extremely frustrating at times but rewarding experience and fingers crossed (at build 16) I’m very close to launch.

Oh and another thing, don’t be a perfectionist and try and do this ish coz that’s a whole other problem. I’m in UX so just couldn’t put out slop so I’m happy with what I’ve got and if someone calls it simple that’ll be the most praise I could get coz I literally don’t even want you to know the apps there (other than opening it) coz I made every effort to get outta your way.

If I sound a little delirious it’s coz I been at it 6 weeks straight literally night and day (did I say it’s also kinda addictive, lol) but yeah just wanted to say hi, share a little of my experience and tell folks to keep on keeping on.

Not looking for "AI hallucinated code" , everyone's has faced that. More curious about the process mistakes. Like trusting the AI's file structure too early, not reading generated code before shipping it, skipping version control because "it's just a prototype," or picking the wrong tool for the job and finding out three hours in.

What's the thing you now do differently because you got burned once?

I keep seeing posts on here from people saying they completely lost everything they built after an AI went off the rails. (I know some are bots, but still).

Seriously, do you guys not know how to use local Git?

Just initialize a repo. Commit your stable code before you start building out a new feature. When the AI inevitably breaks something or turns your codebase into spaghetti, just revert back to your last working state and learn from it.

It takes two seconds and saves hours of loss work.

Edit:

For those who actually don't know the commands, it’s just three lines in your terminal once your code is working:

1. ⁠git status⁠ (to see what files were modified)
2. ⁠git add .⁠ (to stage all the changes)
3. ⁠git commit -m "working state"⁠ (to save your progress)

Done. Now you have a restore point for when things go south.

Hey I'm 17 and I want to be able to do more than print hello world. I've covered rudimentary concepts in mainly Java and python in school and I want to sort of get ahead before I get into uni where I'll hopefully be pursuing a similar stream. Materials online seem to have different approaches and it's only confused me more. How do I efficiently learn how to simultaneously code and use ai tools? I'm very new to all this and any advice at all will be really helpful!