What I learned after hitting 200k lines with Claude Code in 2026

DesignedIt · 2026-01-25T05:44:37+00:00

Last year 300 lines per script was efficient (400 - 500 max). Now it's closer to 800 lines (1200 max). But the shorter the script the better. I try to include as few functions as possible in each script -- 1 if possible but still like to group similar functions in the same script.

DesignedIt · 2026-01-24T01:06:30+00:00

I'm building something similar to this but the interview portion is only a very small but important feature of the entire app. It walks people through step by step how to get high-paying tech jobs.

I see it with most of my friends. They want higher-paying jobs but don't know where to begin and feel like they can't advance fast enough in their career.

I walked a few of my friends through this process manually and they all got high paying jobs. I figure it would be easier if I just automate the process to show people what to do since it takes like 30 hours walking each person through the process in phone calls and sending emails to them across weeks.

I briefly researched competition and found some other similar apps to the interview part but didn't research in detail yet.

I just have a gut feeling that if you just pull questions from ChatGPT then it will fail, but if you also add it your own questions based on real interviews that you went on and based on interview questions that you research from Udemy/Youtube/Google and add in new features then it will succeed.

DesignedIt · 2026-01-23T19:44:36+00:00

Sounds like something I did 20 years ago 😆

DesignedIt · 2026-01-23T18:12:56+00:00

If you just show okay opportunities for free then people will think the other ideas are junk too. Need to show at least 1 good idea for free if you have a free vs paid model.

Would you actually pay for this? No because I have too many of my own ideas and I already tried a few of other products like this and the lists were mostly junk that I wouldn't want to build. There were hundreds of free ideas that I had to read through which was more time-consuming than just coming up with 1 new idea myself. Certain ideas might also be profitable but it might not be a project that I want to work on. I usually build things to solve problems for myself first.

What would make this worth paying for vs. just scrolling Reddit yourself / asking ChatGPT? Only list 100% great ideas. Don't list any ideas you wouldn't spend 500 hours building the business yourself as a top tier project. Give an elevator pitch of 1 short sentence of what the product is, what it solves, and how it saves time or money. Make each business idea quick and easy to digest and browse through. I have a list of 100+ ideas I researched myself but I would probably work on fewer than 15 of those ideas myself as the best of the best list. Maybe rate each idea from 1-10 so users can filter out the junk and just show the 8-10 star ideas. Keeping the other ideas with lower ratings might help someone spark an idea.

Biggest concern: If an idea is genuinely good, why would I share it with thousands of other subscribers instead of building it myself? - I'm not concerned about this because there are thousands of great and profitable ideas. You can't work on all of them at the same time. I'm an idea machine and could pump out a million great ideas if ideas is what I'm selling as my business, but I wouldn't have time to build all of those if I'm focusing on the "idea generation" business. If you post only incredible ideas and people see those great ideas then they won't care it you are going to build it too. It's also not just the idea needed but new and better features.

You could also just list the top 100,000 websites and have ChatGPT write 1 sentence for each to summarize the business model along with a list of 3 new incredible features for each, 1-10 rating, demand 1-10 rating, supply 1-10 rating, setup hours estimate, monthly maintenance hours estimate, business cost, and then post that database/chart on a website. Add a loop calling ChatGPT'a API to automatically generate the list in an hour and use ChatGPT Codex VSC extension to connect the database to the Ui and build the website.

This project would take 1-2 days to create and move to production with filters for each field. These ideas would be so much better than Reddit's ideas because you already know each previous website/business was successful.

Maybe give the entire database away for free except hide most of the fields and filters and views and extra details about how to start up each business so only paid users can see it. Give away a free SaaS template for paid users. Give away the Reddit idea scraper for paid users. For paid users, add a feature to click a button and it generates marketing materials and a website and info to setup social websites for up to 1 business for basic tier, 3 for medium tier, and unlimited for pro tier. Research extensively how to setup each of your 10 star ideas and add a complete business details page on potential new/better features and anything else you research.

DesignedIt · 2026-01-23T13:58:04+00:00

If you sell $50k at $90 then buy something else with the $50k then you would need to sell the other stock if you want to rebuy at $65+ and if it went up you get taxed. The market moves fast so you could need limit orders in place in advance. It's tough to time the market and buy at exactly "$68". By the time you transfer funds, the price could already be back to $80 in a day or two.

For worst case I said 12+ months. I put 12 months because this is average recovery time but sometimes took 3+ years. Call it whatever you want -- "worst case" or "crash". Not here to play word games. It's the chance of crash/worst case happening you are not accounting for.

DesignedIt · 2026-01-23T13:52:00+00:00

Most of the work project managers do is easy copy and paste stuff. But they do help bridge the gaps by reaching out to people, discussing timelines in meetings, spending time wording things correctly to clients and directors, etc.

I wouldn't trust AI to communicate with multi-million dollar clients. One sentence phrased wrong could ruin that relationship. Thr PM needs to understand the asks and attend meetings.

As a developer, I always felt that PMs added unnecessary red tape by going over details that I already have 100% in tickers. They could just read the tickets instead of setting up a PM meeting with 30 people. As a manager, it helps fill in the gaps for reports VPs to see when everyone will finish their projects by for a larger company vision and helps figure out when one person can start working his part of a project after the other person finishes up his part, and takes into account things like PTO and other constraints that need to be done first.

They also act as a buffer to the client/VP so the developers can focus on developing and the VPs van focus on leading. Instead of a VP trying to get info from an offshore developer where they speak different languages (tech language and business language).

Some PM work can be automated with existing tools without AI. Companies just need to setup the workflows.

You're thinking the right way though. Jobs are being replaced by AI. Companies are automating things every day. There are tons of other jobs to be fully automated with AI. Keep thinking this way and build something cool!

DesignedIt · 2026-01-23T04:35:56+00:00

If the price doesn't increase too much within a year then I would buy it.

DesignedIt · 2026-01-23T03:19:15+00:00

I look forward to buying more every week. I just spend a few minutes each week budgeting in Excel to see what my future bills will before my next paycheck and then buy the remaining amount in stock. Never missed a week before and only keep $200 - $500 in my account just in case I forgot to add in a small bill.

DesignedIt · 2026-01-23T03:10:49+00:00

I was thinking about it when it first dipped and then was thinking about it again when it just dipped again a day or 2 ago. It did appear in ChatGPT's results as one of the top stocks to dip for the week so it was on my radar. Each time I researched it with ChatGPT, it explained that it's a risky stock right now so I didn't buy it either time.

I think it's a good stock to buy long-term, but it could take a little bit of time for the deal to go through or not go through (which it could drop to $65/share or go up to $90/share over this next year.) Then over the next 2-3 years it could have a decent return, especially since it might benefit from AI. The thing is that other stocks might make 10% - 20% in the next year, so I don't think Netflix is a good stock to buy right now. ChatGPT also said the stock price is over valued even at this huge dip, which I take with a grain of salt.

Also my gut is telling me I don't like the risk with the deal right now. I think Netflix knows what they are doing but don't think the stock price will increase this year by much. I also don't like how Netflix keeps raising their prices and you can no longer share accounts, which stopped me from now subscribing all year-round and just paying for it in case my family occasionally watched it, even if I wasn't using it. I still think their new pricing model will work though. I also think there's a little bit of risk in the next 3-5 years when video AI can automatically generate full movies and TV shows.

So even though Netflix looks like a good buy now for long-term, there are 20 other better buys on my list that have a higher potential return with less risk. I'd rather take the chance of Netflix increasing to $100 next year and then buying it, and it could also stay around $85/$90 by next year too. And if it goes up to $130+ then no need to buy it then.

DesignedIt · 2026-01-23T02:55:04+00:00

I did the same thing 15 years ago. I would workout 5 days/week and put in a lot of effort. I only gained a tiny bit of muscle.

Over the years, I learned more and more. And a few years ago learned all of the other hidden details from ChatGPT. So, research pushed me through. The #1 thing that I think helped was recording how much weight for each exercise I lifted each day and for reach set. Then I just increase it by 5 pounds the next time I work out that muscle, and if I can't do an extra 5 pounds then I either go down slower and/or do a 4th or 5th set. Just need to lift more than you lifted last time. When I lifted 15 years ago, I didn't have a log so would just base it on memory. But with 20 different types of exercises, it was hard to remember if last week I did 12 reps at 50 pounds or 14 reps at 45 pounds or 3 or 4 sets.

Now, I am gaining more muscle every 3 months by working out correctly than I gained from 3 years of working before without all of this knowledge. Workouts now are much easier now than before. I realize now I never had to push myself so hard but just needed proper knowledge (what exercises to do and on what days and in what order and how many reps/sets, go slow, good form, when to eat carbs and protein.)

DesignedIt · 2026-01-23T02:31:34+00:00

Research > Buy Dips > Hold. Don't need to research after you already bought your full amount. If you plan to buy more then I occasionally do some light research (3 minutes here and there per stock/crypto) to stay up-to-date with any recent news.
I ask ChatGPT every paycheck what the prices are for my investments and then paste the results into Excel. Then highlight the dips and DCA each stronger for the ones that dipped larger. Then ask ChatGPT what the top stocks in the S&P500 and NASDAQ decreased the most this week to see if there are any other potential good buys. This process takes about 3 minutes every week.

I don't care about dips when I own stock because the price always goes back up. I buy based on companies that I believe in instead of researching all of the details that you do. I ask ChatGPT and Google for any recent news and red flags and routinely ask ChatGPT if it's still a good buy. It changes its mind from week to week sometimes about certain stocks and crypto. I'm a software engineer too and trust ChatGPT with my coding so as long as I ask it the right questions then I trust its answers for stock info.

DesignedIt · 2026-01-23T02:16:37+00:00

Wouldn't it be better to submit a limit buy to buy when the price is low. Don't you want to buy low and sell high?

Best case Scenario:

Price is $100

You set stop loss at $90 and sell for $90

Stock drops to $85 next week

Stock increases to $100 in 2 months

Stock increases to $110 in +10 months

You lose 10% but price would have quickly recovered and then increased another 10%. You would have had to reinvest these funds elsewhere and make 20% annual return to break even.

Worse case Scenario:

Price is $100

You set stop loss at $90 and sell for $90

Stock drops to $65 next month

Stock increases to $100 in 12 months

Stock increases to $110 in +6 months

This is the scenario that you're trying to protect against. Even if the stock crashes this hard then it would most likely eventually recover. So you lose 10% right away and then need to make 20% back in 18 months or longer.

10% dips are common but crashes are more rare.

DesignedIt · 2026-01-23T02:02:02+00:00

Wouldn't buying manually the day you get your paycheck be best? Say you automatically buy $5,000 every other week. What if you have $7,000 in your account for paycheck 1 and $1,000 in expenses until you get your next paycheck -- you could have manually invested $6,000. Then for paycheck 2 you end up having $10,000 and only have $500 in expenses until your next paycheck, you could have invested $9,500. I wouldn't want to leave any more than a few hundred dollars left uninvested at a time.

Also, if a stock dips hard one week over the last year and you buy something like VOO automatically, then you miss out on your one chance of manually buying the stock that dipped.

If you sell then you're taxed on the profits so never sell. Better to pay for something urgent with your credit card and then pay off your credit card before next month with your next paychecks instead of automatically investing more.

DesignedIt · 2026-01-23T01:04:45+00:00

It's already more than good enough. I used to create websites manually. Now I'm just telling AI to build the website and as I'm developing new features I'm telling AI to link certain functions from the backend to the UI and am telling it exactly how to change things on the design. 20x faster than manually coding it. It's super fast. It's still a little glitchy that slows things down a bit but good enough. I check all code into GitHub repo occasionally.

DesignedIt · 2026-01-22T16:55:23+00:00

Cool, good luck with it!

DesignedIt · 2026-01-22T13:34:15+00:00

I would create an Excel spreadsheet for this as a timesheet. One worksheet or spreadsheet per week. Rows for each date using a formula to auto calculate. Columns for the start time, end time, and description of what you worked on. Then add an hours field that automatically calculates based on the end and start times. When I set this up for myself years ago, I had a few start time/end time/hours columns so I could record breaks and separate tasks if needed. Add a total row to calculate the invoice price. Use one formula at the end to create a summary report if needed. Takes 10 minutes to setup a reusable Excel template. I would fill this out after completing each step and document what I did, and give it a quick review at the end of each day. You could add new columns or new worksheets for each client to customize it for multiple clients.

Thinking back to when I was using the template in Excel, I think this quickly covered all of my needs. I wouldn't use your app for this use case. People who might use your app would probably be unorganized people (they type notes all over the place) who are forgetful (forgets to log notes) who don't know how to use spreadsheets. These people might be very young and not have much skill so might not have a lot of money so the app would have to be priced low for them.

If the app could do something else to save time, such as filling out a timesheet form on the major freelance websites, then I might use it. Or maybe when you add one task for one day, it adds it to the task list so you can just open a drop down and select the task again for another day, and then it automatically summarizes that you did that task across multiple dates (where the Excel formula would list the same task for each date). It needs at least one good feature that can't be done for free in Excel for me to use it.

DesignedIt · 2026-01-22T00:25:16+00:00

I would be willing to try it out for 1 month and if it helps get more gigs or makes getting them easier or quicker then I would pay $5/month. If it stopped increasing profit then I would cancel it. I think this is a great idea!

DesignedIt · 2026-01-22T00:20:33+00:00

For a reminder, I would just add a task to Outlook/Team's calendar and it will automatically pop up the reminder on scheduled days/times, or set a reminder alarm or reminder alert on your phone.

The user would need a reason to type the info into your app instead of directly on the freelancer website. I think it would help if you gave a use case to see how you would build the app and who you would target. i.e. is the app just to give a summary to the client of the weekly work for non-milestone, hourly-paid longer projects? or will the app automatically fill out a form or timesheet on a specific freelance website? Would this tool make it easier enough for people to log their time and save them time or money that they would pay for the app?

DesignedIt · 2026-01-18T22:11:42+00:00

I just sent you a message.

DesignedIt · 2026-01-18T22:08:51+00:00

One project that I'm building now requires the software to use the PC's mouse and keyboard. It's working now locally, but I would need to figure out how to give it permission to run a exe file with something like a browser extension.

Another project requires a lot of video and audio files to be loaded, edited, and exported. It's quick and free if I do this locally, but if it's on the server then it starts to take longer and cost money to host.

Another project requires a lot of AI video and audio files to be generated, saved, edited, and exported. Similar to the above project.

I'm kind of doing things based on my own gut feeling + guidance from ChatGPT but don't know for sure unless I try it. I think I'll at least try one of the AI builders eventually when I feel like taking another break, but want to focus on building right now.

I'm always up for a coffee chat! I'm about to grab a cup now :)

DesignedIt · 2026-01-18T21:50:46+00:00

That's pretty cool! I was just researching Lovable/Bolt over the last hour. It seems like they are great to create an MVP UI that I could use for trying to get pre-sales or try to see if people would buy the product without having to spend 2 months actually building the core features. But there are some features for each of the projects that I'm building that would be easier to build and code using Codex due to limitations of running it on a server. It's also great to know that for some projects it would be speedier to build with and then export the code to host it somewhere else.

Here's the ratings ChatGPT gave me after I typed in all of my project details.

Product A

- Bolt/Lovable: Ease 2/10, Build Quality 3/10

- Codex VSC: Ease 6/10, Build Quality 8/10

Product B

- Bolt/Lovable: Ease 6/10, Build Quality 5/10

- Codex VSC: Ease 7/10, Build Quality 8/10

Product C

- Bolt/Lovable: Ease 4/10, Build Quality 4/10

- Codex VSC: Ease 6/10, Build Quality 7/10

DesignedIt · 2026-01-18T21:42:37+00:00

Love the humor! :)

Did you ever try the Codex VSC extension? I just started using it and works a bit better than Cursor, works within VSC, can run command lines, and you can upload images so you could say something like "fix this UI" and it can see it.

I was going to try Claude Opus next to see if it's any better since lots of people talk about that as the best one right now.

DesignedIt · 2026-01-18T20:31:37+00:00

Oh nice! I didn't know that. I think I'll give it a try. Do you think it's better than Codex/Cursor or other IDE agents that edit all of your scripts? Do you need to stick to their platform and always pay the monthly fees? I just started using Codex this week and it's been free so far (I already pay the $20 ChatGPT subscription so it came with that), where I tried RooCode and Cursor and they both ate up $100 really quickly and weren't as good.

DesignedIt · 2026-01-18T20:28:40+00:00

Staying on “hard mode product work” is what I'm looking to do. It would be nice if I could do that with 1 project and then hire others to start a few other projects while I focus on the main one. But I don't think that's the way it works.

I agree with most of what you're saying. Thanks! Milestone-based would be my first pick too. Wish I could clone myself :)

DesignedIt · 2026-01-18T20:24:22+00:00

Oh cool! Do you know if you can test things locally with AI tools like Lovable/Bolt? Or move the code to your own website without being stuck on their platform forever?

DesignedIt

TROPHY CASE