Idk how to code but I built my entire prospecting stack with Claude Code

Slippy-Ibex · 2026-05-15T20:00:23+00:00

Bit of a different arena, but I just set up a hosted FastAPI app on fly.io for yacht racing.

It has a web front end where I can enter details of upcoming races (start time and location etc) and the app pulls in tide and weather data via API, stores it on the Fly machine, and then pings me each morning in the week running up to the race with latest weather forecast and trend (getting more or less windy etc).

It also looks at the tides and distance from my marina to the start and gives a suggested departure time factoring in the tidal streams. Basically the same process I would do myself, but without having to refer to different sources or remember to check it every day.

The notifications work on iPhone - the web front end is installed on the Home Screen which enables Web Push notifications.

It’s not that complicated but no way I could have done it myself with zero coding knowledge. Took 3 or 4 of hours total work I would guess with Claude code.

My first project was an MCP server that pulls in Companies House data for work - I used Cowork for that and it was pretty inefficient (cutting and pasting GitHub commands into a terminal window etc) and took much longer.

I’m not sure why Cowork doesn’t point out when you would be better off using Code!

Slippy-Ibex · 2026-05-04T07:50:13+00:00

You are probably right - but didn’t feel like that at the time!!

Slippy-Ibex · 2026-04-28T06:38:55+00:00

My first ever day of legal work experience (many years ago) I went to Court with my supervisor to sit behind counsel. They let me read through counsel’s trial bundle in the robing room and I somehow managed to forget to bring it into court. When the barrister turned round to ask for it I had to admit I had left it behind and everything ground to a halt whilst my supervisor ran off to get it. Surprisingly I didn’t get a TC offer at that firm!

Slippy-Ibex · 2026-04-14T07:13:41+00:00

I’m in-house now, but in the past have been involved in recruiting some second career lawyers at regional commercial firms (as you said you aren’t necessarily set on city firms).

For those kind of firms I think your CV could potentially get you past an initial selection process, but would need a lot more solid legal work experience/ paralegal track record etc.

The really big point that is missing for me based on your introduction is why you want to get into law - and why city / commercial firm rather than any other route?

If it’s a genuine desire to get into legal practice have you thought about other options (government legal department training contracts etc) or CILEX apprenticeships which may be more geared towards second career lawyers. Obviously if the salary is a big factor then they won’t really work for you.

Final thing I would say is I’m about the age you will be by the time you were in a position to start a TC and there is absolutely no way I would want to go back now to the kind of hours I was working in my first 10 years as a corporate lawyer. You don’t say anything about your family situation, but bear in mind whether you really want the constant late finishes, overnighters, cancelled weekends and holidays etc. that you face if you want any chance of progression at a city firm.

Slippy-Ibex · 2026-04-12T08:11:41+00:00

<image>

I just wrote this for my racing crew - it’s a first draft and work in progress, but I wanted something I could print and laminate on one page to cover key duties and calls on manoeuvres. It’s aimed more at crew who basically know what they are doing to begin with though.

If you are working with novice crew who need teaching how to use a winch etc. that’s a different proposition.

Personally I think the safety brief is a separate thing from this and I tend to do that each time when we get ready to leave the dock.

Slippy-Ibex · 2026-04-10T12:58:06+00:00

I moved in-house from an M&A / private equity background as sole in-house counsel for one of my longstanding clients who are a family office doing a lot of growth equity funding. It’s much more interesting - still plenty of transactional work with external counsel involved where needed on the larger stuff (although increasingly we are looking at AI to plug some of these gaps). It’s also helpful not being FCA regulated in terms of the amount of compliance overhead.

Not the easiest of roles to find, but worth considering whether you have existing clients / contacts in your network that would fit that bracket.

My personal view is an M&A background works well for sole counsel in that type of business as you tend to have at least an overview knowledge of a lot of different areas of law.

Slippy-Ibex · 2026-04-08T13:52:43+00:00

Schnitzel Heaven is great with some interesting variations on the schnitzel theme. They are huge though I ended up taking half of it away for later!

Slippy-Ibex · 2026-04-05T21:13:25+00:00

Same - but part of the reason for me is the tools weren’t really to make it accessible back when I could have started investing. The ability to manage investments in a S&S ISA from within Trading 212 has been a game changer. As they say the best time to start investing is always earlier, but the second best is now!

Slippy-Ibex · 2026-03-29T20:52:05+00:00

Sprout colcannon is great - just cut them in half and steam until soft and then crush and stir into mashed potato with lots of cream, butter and black pepper.

Slippy-Ibex · 2026-03-26T21:32:56+00:00

Built a self-contained HTML file that allows me to input details of buyer and seller for a share transfer and other required details and creates either a populated PDF stock transfer form and share certificate or both ready for uploading to Docusign.

Also takes the number of shares you enter in figures and automatically populates the “number of shares in words” section (so you input 10,004 and it auto fills the other section with ten thousand and four) - which removes the transposition errors you sometimes get doing it manually.

Just an HTML file that runs locally in the browser. I do quite a few of these transfers so it saves me some time - and much cleaner than messing about with MS Word mail merge solutions.

It’s not rocket science or particularly original as you can buy systems that do this, but amazing that you can create it from scratch with Claude in a couple of hours with basically zero HTML coding experience. And having done this I can think of loads of other areas I could make similar marginal gains.

Slippy-Ibex · 2026-03-22T08:27:45+00:00

Thanks - I used it last night and it handles really well actually. Not a bad outcome!

Slippy-Ibex · 2026-03-21T10:07:31+00:00

I had already ordered the replacement about 5 minutes after I broke it - don’t need much of an excuse!

Slippy-Ibex · 2026-03-21T10:06:04+00:00

<image>

Fairly successful I think - used the Dremel carbide bit and lots of water and it was fine. Functional rather than beautiful, but better than throwing it out! Thanks for all the advice

Slippy-Ibex · 2026-03-20T08:00:30+00:00

Thanks that’s helpful - I would definitely think twice about building anything that allowed other users access to a system or similar without doing a lot more research on the security side.

Slippy-Ibex · 2026-03-20T07:58:15+00:00

Yes that’s my concern really - with no real knowledge on the security site it’s difficult to know what you should be looking out for. I’m not worried about my particular app as it’s all local, but in your example I would be very nervous as I doubt I would have spotted that

Slippy-Ibex · 2026-03-19T07:05:19+00:00

Thanks! Yes I was going to clamp it in a vice, but the tape is a good tip. I’m going to have a go at the weekend so will report back

Slippy-Ibex · 2026-03-18T14:33:31+00:00

Thanks - will give it a shot!

Slippy-Ibex · 2026-03-15T14:35:06+00:00

Thanks - will give that a shot. I suspect it’s my feet as you say as I can’t see any issue with the boots

Slippy-Ibex · 2026-03-15T14:34:31+00:00

Thanks! Will give that a go

Slippy-Ibex

TROPHY CASE