PAGES25
WORDS19,768
SOURCES31
READ TIME86 min
TYPEHUB
CHECKED25 AUG 26
Everything on this site about assembling things with AI, ordered from the decision to build through to handing it over.
◈ THE THING THIS HUB ADDS
Most guides ask how do I build this. The more useful question is who a given setup suits — because the same technique is right for one kind of work and wrong for another.
A prototyper needs loose loops and throwaway scaffolding. A maintainer needs permission tiers and an audit trail. Handing either one the other’s setup makes them slower. The five roles are on the archetypes page.
Start here
If you have not built anything yet.
EXPLAINER · 4 MINPrompting 101: The Complete Beginner's Guide to AI PromptingNew to AI prompting? Learn what a prompt is, why specificity matters, and the exact structure that separates amateur AI outputs frEXPLAINER · 3 MINWhat a Repo Is, and How Repos Actually WorkA repository is a folder with a memory. Explained plainly, with sources named and dated.EXPLAINER · 4 MINWhat AI Skills Are, and How They WorkSkills are packaged know-how an AI loads on demand; tools are the functions it can call; MCP is the open socket…
Before you build
Two of these questions should sometimes stop you.
THE CRAFT · 3 MIN · 1 SOURCESThe Agent BriefA copyable structure for briefing an agent — objective, scope, done-condition, stop-conditions, evidence — with the reasoning behiTHE CRAFT · 5 MINAutomationsChains that run without you. Reversibility as the design axis, idempotency, what to log, where the human checkpoint goes, and whenTHE CRAFT · 2 MINPrompt, Context, Skill, or Fine-TuneFour ways to shape model behaviour at wildly different costs, and how to choose. Most problems taken to fine-tuning are context prTHE RECORD · 4 MINWHEN NOT TO USE AINine cases where reaching for AI makes the outcome worse, from someone who uses these tools daily.
Who each setup suits
The same technique is right for one kind of work and wrong for another.
Agents
What they are, how they fail, and how to bound them.
THE CRAFT · 6 MIN · 2 SOURCESPrompting AgentsBriefing something that acts: the specification, the six ways agents fail, the dry run, and designing work so you can actually cheTHE CRAFT · 3 MINPermission Tiers for AgentsFive levels of permission, assigned per task by how hard the action is to undo rather than by how much you trust the agent — and wTHE CRAFT · 2 MIN · 1 SOURCESMulti-Agent: When It Helps and When It Does NotWhy chaining agents degrades reliability — compounding error, lossy handoffs, unattributable failure — and the four cases where thTHE CRAFT · 2 MINDiagnosing a Run That Went WrongThe agent finished, the output is wrong, and you have a transcript. How to find the first wrong step rather than debugging its conDATED · 9 MIN · 15 SOURCESAI AGENTSAgents act instead of answering. What changed, when, and what it actually means.
Skills and context
Reusable instruction, and what it costs to trust someone else’s.
THE CRAFT · 2 MINSkills, Repos and MCPWhat these three actually are, explained without assuming you write code. The widest open gap in the category.THE CRAFT · 3 MIN · 1 SOURCESSkills Are a Supply ChainInstalling a skill means loading someone else’s instructions into your agent’s context. An audit of 3,984 published skills found 1THE CRAFT · 3 MIN · 2 SOURCESContext EngineeringPrompting is now the small part of the job. What surrounds the prompt — the material, the history, the tools, the memory — is the THE CRAFT · 3 MINReusable Context Beats Reusable PromptsPrompts encode how to ask a particular model and expire with it. Context encodes what is true about your work and does not. How to
Loops and review
Which iteration converges and which quietly drifts.
THE CRAFT · 3 MIN · 2 SOURCESLoops That Improve and Loops That DegradeSome iteration converges and some polishes its own output while appearing to improve. The difference is whether new information enTHE CRAFT · 2 MINThe Review Loop, In OrderFrame, then facts, then structure, then language. Each pass can invalidate everything below it, so reviewing in the wrong order meEXPLAINER · 5 MINThe Iterative Workflow: How to Refine AI Output Instead of Starting OverThe 4-round iterative AI workflow, img2img refinement, and when to cut your losses. Professional AI output rarely comes from firstTHE RECORD · 3 MIN · 1 SOURCESAuditing AI-Generated WorkChecking everything is not a strategy. Four risk tiers with a different check for each, the five signals worth looking for specifiTHE RECORD · 3 MINThe Cost of Checking Too MuchEverything says check more. Almost nothing says where checking stops paying. Review theatre, uniform attention, and the failure no
Cost and handover
What it burns, and what you owe whoever inherits it.
THE CRAFT · 3 MIN · 1 SOURCESWhat You Are Actually BurningYou are billed for everything the model reads, re-sent every turn. Where the cost really goes, why agents multiply it, and the modTHE CRAFT · 3 MIN · 2 SOURCESWhat You Owe a Client Whose System You AutomatedThe handover document, the disclosure, the off switch, and the assertion that makes silent failure visible — plus what you genuineTHE CRAFT · 3 MIN · 2 SOURCESAgent GuardrailsFour lines that belong in every agent prompt. Scope, negatives, injection defence and stopping conditions — the permission model t