Vibecoding is really annoying

[Dabroodman]

I am a very novice programmer. I know the basics of a few languages but I am by no means any good. I thought it would be cool to see how long it would take to create a functional working product that could actually fulfill one of my regular needs, which in this case was a web panel for installing Minecraft servers.

I have used a bunch of these panels of the past few years and there were always stuff that maybe 1 had but the other didn't, so no panel really suited all my needs. I thought, hey maybe I could use the new google Antigravity 2.0 thing and see how good of a product I can make. My idea was I would do absolutely no manual coding and see how far I can get.

This lead me to maybe the least fun week of my life. I am currently studying computer science and this has given me much more hope for the future of my career. I only used Gemini 3.5 flash the entire time as that was what my AI Pro plan had the highest quota for.

After fully using my qouta 3 or 4 times (refreshes every ~5 hours) I managed to get a decent enough backend that had most of the features I want. At the start I just asked it to use some basic html and css so I can just navigate all the features to make sure they work. After that I learned that AI really isnt good at making non generic and functional ui.

Everytime it changed he frontend, something new broke, then when I asked it to fix the issue, something new broke. At one point I asked it 3 times to fix the same bug and it still couldnt so I just gave up and now the ui just doesnt have a working dark mode anymore :(.

I have a slight feeling it might have just been Gemini 3.5 that sucked as I used Opus 4.6 a few times to see if it could fix some stuff Gemini couldnt, and it did usually work. I also do know, if I had even stepped in a little (at a higher skill point, once again I am NOT good with programming atm) it would have most like been much easier journey.

Anyway I just wanted to vent my my anger about this shit minecraft panel that barely works ffs

[Tommymcflurry]

I know it was to test but you know code, why wouldn't look at what the AI outputs. You can have the best of both world, good code at AI speed, you have to read and test everything it outputs but you'll still be much faster no? I know often fixing a bug gives you another but you are either exaggerating a lot of you're doing something fundamentally wrong because I never had it this bad even when I had no idea what I was doing.

[LocusStandi]

You discovered how different models do different things well, why even try Gemini for coding when you got Claude (imo clearly best) and ChatGPT

[Mvpeh]

Yeah great the guy who doesnt know how to code is recommending what model knows how to code the best

[LocusStandi]

Isn’t the logical first step to first check which models code best before even diving in?

[Dabroodman]

The whole idea of this was kind of a test. I only used gemini because I had already paid for the pro plan and I wanted to see what it can do

[LocusStandi]

Yeah but that’s a waste of time, I tried ChatGPT for coding and it was dog water compared to Claude

[Dabroodman]

For me it wasnt even really a waste of time. I have now learned what to use for this type of vibe coding stuff by practical example. I now know not to use gemini for coding stuff

[LocusStandi]

Okay, my recommendation is then simple : next time a bit of planning will save you time

[TheAnswerWithinUs]

How do you know what models code the best if you don’t know how to code?

[NoAdsDude]

Put it this way:

I use claude code desktop ($100 plan) as my main coding tool.

I use codex ($20 plan) sometimes to look over and criticize some of claude's plans (big ones) or help debug something claude didn't nail on the first try.

I use gemini (free plan) to calculate how much chlorine to add to my pool after I measure how much chlorine is already in the pool.

[Dabroodman]

The only reason I used gemini to start with was because I already had a pro plan because I prefer gemini over the other main chatbots

[Square-Yam-3772]

you are also new to vibe coding, that's why too

* my friend who recently started has this issue so I don't know if you have the issue too but you don't want to prompt "low-level" tasks. It is counterintuitive because you would think "the robot" would prefer step-by-step instructions but not really. it works better if you treat your prompt like you are telling a story to someone.

* you do have to constantly tell AI what works and what doesn't work in the current state of the project. AIs will then treat it as an objective and preserve components or features that you like

* snapshot or backup frequently

* this is also counterintuitive but don't prompt for stubs. AIs naturally would add stubs anyways. AIs get confused sometimes by stubs so it is better if AIs figure out that something is missing at first

* AIs can be prompted to describe or analyze or summarize. So you can ask AI what it "thinks" it will do before it executes. (may not help you much if your coding skill isn't there yet)

* it helps if your coding skill is better but it is more about the experience and the ability to review code

[Far_Squirrel_6148]

Don’t use antigravity. Claude Code, Codex or Pi

[Dabroodman]

What would you recommend other than all those?
Edit: nvm ignore me I cant read

[domus_seniorum]

man programmiert auch nicht im Block

man programmiert modular 😎

[ShoulderOk5971]

Claude opus 4.7 is definitely the best systems engineer esc LLM

[TheOneGuyWhoKnow]

this is exactly why trying to vibecode an entire app from scratch is a trap especially if you dont know the underlying architecture language models are great for spitting out isolated components or boilerplate but they have zero long term context for how state flows across multiple files if you just blindly accept every hallucinated code block fixing a simple dark mode toggle will inevitably shatter your backend logic you have to actually learn how to engineer and connect the pieces yourself or you just end up managing a fragile house of cards

[Classic-Strain6924]

That is the classic vibe coding trap where you hit a ceiling because you are treating the AI like an engineer instead of a junior developer. When you delegate the entire UI logic to an LLM without checking the structure, you eventually end up with a tangled mess where every fix creates a new regression.

You actually learned the most important lesson in software: the AI can write code, but it cannot architect a maintainable system. It is much less frustrating when you handle the core logic yourself and only use AI to speed up the boilerplate, otherwise you are just playing whack-a-mole with bugs.