Index

There are no straight lines

In progress

The linear prompt is a lie.

The problem with the prompt → output model is not that it is bad. It is that it is incomplete.

When you open an AI coding tool today, the mental model is:

  • Describe what you want
  • Get a draft
  • Edit or regenerate
  • Repeat until it feels right

Real work is non-linear: it happens in loops, branches and parallel explorations, yet current AI tools force everything through a single prompt → output → tweak pipeline.

Perhaps the most human part of building software is branching. We try one approach, then another. We park ideas we are not sure about. We explore "just to see" and then come back later.