How AI Prototyping and Software Tools Boosted My Productivity 10X in Two Months | 439

Dan Hafner: Hey, what's up everyone? Welcome back into the show. Dan Hafner here. And today we're gonna talk about prototyping.

What is possible ⁓ in this world of AI? And I'm just gonna kind of share a lot of the projects that I've been working on without obviously revealing client details. But I have literally been able to about 10X my output and my productivity in the past two months. And I know that you can do that too, if this is something that you're interested in doing.

If you're interested in building a tool, ⁓ Okay, I got interrupted. So yeah, not sure where I was talking about that, but basically what we're able to do is I go through, it took me about 45 minutes to go through that and just document literally everything, right? Here's what I see on this page. Here's this list.

What does that list contain? It's got work orders. Here's the details. Here's the name.

Here's the amount. using a new Vibe Coder tool, finally launching that idea, including kind of this stuff in your business, whatever it is that you're trying to do. Stay tuned for this episode because I'm gonna dive really into this and just be very frank and very honest. It's a Friday afternoon when I'm recording this and I'm just kind of at that point where I'm ready for a beer and I'm just gonna lay it all out there on the line for you guys.

So I'm in kind of one of those moods. But yeah, let's dive into it. ⁓ It has to have a search capability. When I click on it, what does that page go to?

Like it was, it's very involved. Don't get me wrong. Like it took me 45 minutes to go through just talking like this, just like I am right now, you know, drinking some water, keeping hydrated, like all that stuff. But then what I was able to do is AI, Fathom is recording that for me.

I can then take that transcript, feed it into a tool like a Claude or a chat GPT or whatever, and say, Hey, I need a, I need Man, it's been a very interesting day. So as a side note to this, I'll get into the prototyping stuff here in a second. As a side note to this, ⁓ there was an article I actually found the other day where ⁓ out of nowhere, I mean, I guess not out of nowhere, but all of a sudden, ⁓ Apple ⁓ was cracking down on a lot of these vibe coding tools. If you've seen this, you kind of know what I'm talking about.

They were cracking down on tools as much documented as possible that I can then go into a tool like a vibe code or replator lovable and rebuild this, right? And boom, it just gives it to me, right? ⁓ So the branding a little bit of stuff is off and everything, but I'll tell you what, what it was able to prompt into ⁓ existence is absolutely nuts. I mean, it's wild.

And one of the other cool things about this stuff is ⁓ people's imagination and including mine are running wild, right? So for one, for example, one of these, marketplace apps I was working on, ⁓ I, I'm not going really talk about it cause it's, it's not launched yet. And we didn't sign an NDA, but I'm not just going to like tell her idea, but it is in the, the, the pet space is all I'll really say. But what it was, was we basically had the general idea of what she wanted to build and how she wanted to do it.

And I said, okay, here's what this is going to take and here's how it's going to go. ⁓ and then, you know, that I've talked about on this show, such as Vibe Code, and then another big name in the space called Replet, right? And what was going on with this? Basically, ⁓ Apple was saying that they were violating a long-standing policy that you could ⁓ not basically have one app that is manipulating code and changing things in another app, ⁓ kind of really that's on the app store, right?

So the basic premise of it was you could open the Vibecode app or Replet on your phone and you could Vibecode an app and then you publish it to the app store. Now that app that you created in that app is on the app store and then you can change it from there, right? It's been very awesome, very amazing for building stuff. I can literally be walking my dog and I can type in, we were doing this with my wife other day, we were walking our dogs and I'm like typing in a little text and I'm like, hey, I need this fixed and this fixed and change this and update this.

Put my phone back in my pocket. The next day she emails me this big thing, which was obviously, you know, generated by AI, but it was her idea, right? And it came through and it said, Hey, I want to add this functionality to this app. It want to have it have this and this and this and this and this and this and has to be access and segmented based on role.

And, and I looked at it I was like, you know, if I was building that in a tool, like a bubble or a dollo or something like that, all of those changes and just incorporating that thing would take me. We walk five minutes down the road. My Apple watch pings me and says, Hey, your app's been updated. go and I look, it's all fixed.

It's all changed. It's incredible. Like it's absolutely amazing. The sad thing is, is now that Apple is cracking down on those.

Will that ever come back? I don't know. I really hope it does. Cause it's a major, major pain in my ass now because like a lot of that stuff was kind of how I was sharing with stuff with clients and how I was doing this stuff.

I built an app for my wife that she's been using all the time now. so long, like my heart would drop when I get emails like that of like, damn, like that's, that's going to be a lot of work. I don't know if that's worth it for me, right? But we live in a world, a totally different world now, a world of AI, a world of just magic, right?

That's what I can do is just copy and paste that into AI, have it output software for me. Like I was able to do that in a matter of hours. that you can't really use anymore. it's ⁓ until you publish it, obviously, like if you want to use it in the test app, you can't really do that anymore.

just a very interesting ⁓ thing that's happening. I can't say I'm all that surprised because Apple is traditionally a major ⁓ pain in the butt when it comes to how they make revenue on their store, what they approve, what their policies are. ⁓ Are you guys following what I'm saying here? I guess all I'm trying to say is the world that we're living in inside of software development, inside of the SaaS and online product place.

Your imagination is a literally only the only limit I mean I remember I did episodes on here six months ago You could probably go back and listen to me hating on this stuff and crapping all over and saying it was junk and saying it was terrible I mean I have fully retracted all of those statements by now like I have gone all in on this stuff. It is wildly wildly amazing You know, I've talked about this time and time again thinking through a machine It really is. We're going through a client app publication right now.

It's been rejected like four times because they're just so nitpicky about something that it's like every time we change it, all this is wrong. Now this is wrong. Then we tweak it. Now this is wrong.

And it's, it's a, it's a never ending cycle to be honest. And, ⁓ you know, but it is what it is. So anyway, a little bit of a news update for you there. So yeah, I'm interested to hear your guys' thoughts on that.

Are you supportive of that? Are you bummed about that? Like I am it's, it's not fun. thinking about the outcome you wanna have.

will say, you do, I really don't think anyone can do the one prompt wonder. Unless you're building a super simple to-do list app, there's no way you're gonna just do one prompt and everything's gonna work as you expect it to. Especially with these marketplace ones, these internal tool ones. And we go through it and I notice, oh hey, this overlaps, this design isn't quite right.

This functionality doesn't work, I need this to look a little bit nicer, I need this to look a little bit better. It's not a fun place to be. But anyway, the meat and potatoes of this episode I wanted to get into was ⁓ basically what I was talking about was this prototyping and productivity ⁓ boom that has been happening for a lot of people just like me who are diving into these tools and using these at a level that's just really never been possible before. And a lot of what I have to thank for that is Claude Code.

Now I do know that... I mean, in the scheme of things, a few hundred bucks in credits and some time to just sit there and let the AI work ⁓ is, it's unbelievable, man. I mean, and that's kind of the one thing about, I will say about Claude code and even using different things like when I use it inside of Visual Studio code, it's kind of a code editor that now you can have Claude code inside of so you can just prompt stuff instead of manually coding things. ChatGPT just came out with a newer version and they have Codex and they have all those different things.

To be honest with you, I've never really dove into Codex. I've used it a little bit. ⁓ I just have been a major fan of Cloud Code in the recent couple of months since it's come out and been really ⁓ blowing up in the world. I was kind of like everyone else that jumped that bandwagon from ChatGPT over to Cloud Code.

And to be honest with you, I don't think I'll ever go back. It's a really... ⁓ you'd have to babysit it a little bit, which is kind of annoying. Like you have to sit there and it's like, Hey, do you want to allow this change?

And you can say yes, or you can just say auto allow edits. Just. I don't care what you have to edit, just edit it. I just need it fixed or I just need to change or I just need a built or whatever, which can be dangerous.

You can get in trouble with that a little bit when it's like changes and break stuff. But as long as you're careful, I've never really had that happen. But, ⁓ man, what a world, what a world we are living in. It is absolutely.

really amazing tool and combined with a tool like a vibe code here. I mean, I've been able to build, let me see. I have one, two, Yeah, two marketplaces, like robust marketplaces with payments, with multiple roles, with admin functionalities, with the whole nine yards that I've been able to put together in the past couple of ⁓ weeks. On top of that, three different internal tools ⁓ that have been like QuickBooks integration, Stripe integration, CRM integration.

Absolutely insane and I'm just, I'm here for it all. I'm here for it all. Yeah, I mean, I used to tell people that, you know, a 90 day timeline was pretty normal for building these things. For example, this marketplace I keep referencing, we're about two weeks into it and we are about 95 % done.

Now I will say she, we met this morning and she has a whole different, a whole different scope creep thing that she wants to include in it, which is fine, which is, but you know. I mean, you name it, just basically stuff that's very custom, very boutique that we're taking for processes for not only my business, but client businesses and everything like that and rebuilding them in here. ⁓ And the other two, there's been two rebuilds. So all of these that I'm talking about have been done like the past three weeks, right?

And I'll tell you guys a cool secret about how I do these rebuilds. So for a long time on here, I have been a very heavy proponent of tools like We're also like three weeks ahead of schedule from when she wants to launch already. So we got time, you know what I mean? And now even though that this is like a whole new component that's gonna be embedded in every little piece of that software, it's gonna touch all the different things, the signup processes, the subscription process, the admin process, like everything.

⁓ As long as I have a very clear breakdown and a very clear... ⁓ bubble like Adalo, Flutterflow, those types of tools. To be honest with you, I still have some client apps that we run on those and we build things on there. And it's still a good tool.

Adalo, I should say, has now ⁓ launched an AI builder that lets you basically chat and type and build things just like a lot of these things do. And it builds the screens and it can change your database and works really, well. know, list of like, here's what it needs to do, here's how it needs to function, et cetera. You can feed that into AI and AI is exceptionally good at figuring that out and copying and pasting and going on context and figuring out how piece A fits into piece B.

It's just, it's exceptionally good at it. It just really is. ⁓ So man, it's just, it's what a time, what a time to be alive, what a time to be in this space. And I'm, I'm over the moon excited for.

I will say, however, there have been a couple that have fallen short of what we needed to do inside of a tool like Bubble or Adalo. And what we've been able to do is take that existing tool. I've always talked about this. have an episode about this with a friend of mine, Alex Sanfilippo, that basically rebuilt, they built the platform pod match on Bubble and then they redid it in a custom coded tool.

You can go back and listen. That's a really good episode. for what we're doing and how we're making it work. So you guys can check it out as always.

I'm interested on your thoughts of the Apple blocking vibe code tools, ⁓ which is very, very interesting thing. think that I'm gonna follow that very, very closely, because it really affects the bottom line of my business, to be honest with you, which is really annoying, but I see where they're coming from. So ⁓ yeah, very interesting stuff. And as always, if you wanna work with someone like me, I'd be very interested to see what they do with a platform like this, right?

Where you can just vibe code it and build it and then still launch something in heck of a lot faster for a lot cheaper. So one thing I was able to do, one of these internal tools actually ⁓ was for a client, it's just for him. He's literally the only user of the app because it's an internal tool. It's a way for him to have work orders and document his labor and basically keep up with all the clients and the customers that he's using on a day-to-day basis.

⁓ I'm happy to talk through any ideas, even if it's just like, I got a small budget to talk through, like, how do I get this launched? I'm happy to do those things. Offer paid consultation calls, $75 for the hour. That's all it is.

We'll talk one-on-one with your app, your idea, how all that works, anything like that. You can book that in a link below here in the show notes, ⁓ and you can pick a time that works for you, and I'll show up, and I'm yours for that hour. And we built that all in Adalo. It's all ⁓ cross-functional laptop, tablet, mobile.

⁓ We never published it to the app store because we didn't really need to. He's the only person. It's just a web application. ⁓ And basically, I was able to map it over and make it a hundred times better inside of Vibe Code inside of about a day.

And it was absolutely incredible. And here's how I did it. First thing I did was I opened up the app in Adalo. if you guys want to ⁓ offer that as well.

I did want to say something as well. You guys, there is a website for the Tech Bytes podcast. Now I've never had a website, but thanks to my good friends here at Riverside, who I do host and produce the show through, they gave me a website for free. It's super awesome.

I love it a lot. So you can go to techbytes.riverside.com.

Now it's tech, T-E-C-H, and then And what I was able to do was basically open up a Zoom call for myself, open up my own personal Zoom meeting call, and basically just screen recorded myself walking through it. I have the Fathom recorder tool. You can also probably just record it and export it through Zoom. But I just walked through B-Y-T-E-S, okay?

B-Y-T-E-S dot riverside dot com. And you can check it out. It's pretty simple. It's everything they just created for me, so I didn't have really anything to do with it.

But you can also click that subscribe button in the upper right, and you can get emailed. You can get updates of latest episode drops on top of wherever you're subscribed, on Apple or Google or wherever. ⁓ And then you can also go back and listen to all the previous shows, all the previous episodes. get links to the Apple Podcast shows, the show on Spotify, YouTube, Amazon Music, anywhere that you want to do that.

You can search through the history of episodes. It's really, really cool. And I just want to thank my friends at Riverside for putting that together and publishing that for me. I didn't even ask for it, but it's pretty awesome.

So be sure to go over to techbytes.riverside.com, subscribe to the show so you can get updates on episodes like this, and then search through anything that you might find value in the past of this show. All right, guys, that is it for this episode.

Get out there, go build some stuff. And I'm very excited. We'll talk to you in the next one. See ya.