Coding

Notice you no longer understand your own app, and go back to coding by hand

A solo developer who added features at breakneck speed with Claude realized he no longer understood his app.

By trencedamp on Hacker News · Posted · Added Oct 15, 2026

Difficulty
BeginnerOur rating
Time to build
n/aOur estimate
Monthly cost
Not reported
Revenue
Not reportedWe only show revenue the source states
Engagement
62 HN points53 comments · fetched Oct 15, 2026

What they did

trencedamp had been building a new version of his successful app with Claude for about six months.

How it went

He realized he had no clue how parts of it worked and decided to code by hand again.

Worth knowing

Speed without understanding is a risk for apps you must maintain.

Builder recipe

Our own starting point, written from the source. Adapt it to your setup.

Stack

  • Your editor
  • Code review habits

Steps

  1. Read every diff before accepting it.
  2. Ask the agent to explain changes.
  3. Write the core logic yourself.

Starter prompt

Explain this change line by line as if I will maintain it alone, and list anything you are unsure about.

Tags

Agent Claude
Industry Software

Read the original

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