I’m on a flight back to the states after a 10 day trip to Tokyo with the fam. We probably rode 100 trains through who knows how many stations, and I kept thinking how cool it would be to visualize the pathways that people take as they navigate through the corridors. Timely and cool find!
I think there are broadly two types of problems - ones where you get partial credit, and ones where you don't. The restaurant example is one where you don't get partial credit - 98% of food being safe isn't enough, it's all or nothing. Paying your employees - all or nothing, you miss a paycheck once, it's a huge problem.
CSS on a website, however, you CAN get partial credit (to an extent). It may not be perfect, but it's at least theoretically still providing some value partially.
I think knowing what kind of problem you're facing is really important when it comes to measuring percentage of "complete".
Yes, the decision to rely on modern CSS is more like serving restaurant food that contains cilantro. The predominant failure mode is partial credit.
The quality perception of this user segment is relative, too. That visitor who is using a version of Chrome that is 4 years stale? Their experience on the rest of the web was not pixel-perfect today. Many sites are inexplicably buggy for them. They might even be used to having to switch devices to complete some tasks.
Continuing to surf the web with a long-unpatched browser is also overtly negligent [1]. That negligent 2% of users is not a protected class. As such, you might observe that this 2% of users contributes only 0.2% of revenue / engagement / value and make a self-interested decision to stop supporting them.
[1] Except brief windows of time when old Apple devices continue to get Safari security updates without getting feature updates. Not relevant to the author's CSS nesting example.
Nice! I actually started to build this exact thing a couple years back, and ended up abstracting it out to something more generic with https://picshift.io/. That said, I still love the screenshot use case - the original name of this project was ScreenSync ;)
I'm curious how much y'all used AI in the development process of the app. Definitely a lot of thought put into the architecture as shown in the post here, what was the split of human written vs. AI-written code? Especially curious given v0 is intended for building with AI.
Really great writeup, super thoughtful! Been a v0 user and fan for awhile now, excited to give this a shot!
Our biggest usage of AI was actually a code review bot which lives on GitHub PRs. It reviews our code on every commit. It was originally an internal tool, but it's now Vercel Agent.
We also used v0 for prototyping ideas and designs for the native app.
This is awesome, and proves that code, really, is a hack. People don’t want code. It sucks, it’s hard to maintain, it has bugs, it has to be updated all the time. Gross.
What people want isn’t code - they want computers to do stuff for them. It just happens that right now, code is the best way you can do it.
The paradigm WILL change. It’s really just a matter of when. I think the point you make that these are problems of DEGREE, not problems of KIND is very important. It’s plausible, now it’s just optimization, and we know how that goes and have plenty of history to prove we consistently underestimate the degree to which computation can get faster and cheaper.
Code is a hack in the same way that gears and wheels and levers are hacks. People don’t want mechanical components, they just want machines to do stuff for them.
Most of web applications are CRUD apps - they store information in a database, and allow modifying & retrieving it later. People generally expect these systems to be deterministic, so that the data you submit will be later available in same format.
I certainly wouldn't want a patient healthcare system that might return slightly different results, or store the data in different format each time you make a request. Code is and will continue to be the best way to build deterministic computer information systems, regardless of whether it's generated by humans or AI.
Picshift.io: upload an image, get a URL, change what shows at that URL whenever you want. Works anywhere an image link works.
You can randomize and schedule images to show up at the link as well. Super useful for marketing, maintaining screenshots on a website or in documentation, etc.
We created CrowdSync to help automate tedious, repetitive process with people, things like sending emails, requesting documents, scheduling time, requesting payments, and more!
This came out of my experience as a user researcher, where we'd spend hours onboarding people into studies - having them sign consent forms, be sent study information, scheduling time, sending reminders and payments.
As it turns out, this problem exists in a number of domains, especially any kind of onboarding of employees.
One question we get often is "Can't people just do this with Zapier?"
The answer to that is, not really, for a couple primary reasons:
- Zapier is fantastic for people who are somewhat technically minded, however, falls quite short with lay audiences (think about a membership coordinator working at a non-profit, or an HR assistant). While some of these audiences are adept at using tools like Zapier, a huge portion aren't. They need a single, centralized place.
- Zapier (and related) aren't particularly good at handling people through a process. They're great for shuffling data around, but not great at both showing where people are, as well as providing people-oriented interactions (automated reminders, etc).
In short, CrowdSync is for helping to put a number of people through the same process, where repetitive work can easily be systemized and tracked.
Honestly, having the time for this stuff is about intentionality. It doesn't happen without structure, planning and a commitment to making those things happen. Else, excuses and life in general end up ruining the best intentions. I've found that the best way to get results is to establish a strong structure and routine, and let that guide your activities.
Another related point: don't think about "finishing this book" or other completion-related goals. Those get overwhelming, and you'll find yourself falling out of the habit, just due to the perceived effort.
Instead, work on managing the ACTIVITIES, not the result. Don't say you want to finish X book - say you want to read for 30 minutes a day, that's it. By managing those activities, you'll end up with the results you want by default. Honestly, it just works.
To sum it up: make a routine, manage the activities, NOT the results, and commit to yourself to make the time. Fact is, successful folks are successful because they take it on themselves to make things happen. Start with 30 minutes, and you'll see that it wickedly changes your outlook.
Hey thanks for dropping by a great advice :) I understand the need for a strong structure, but don't you think depending upon the type of person you are you end up prioritizing one thing over the other ? For eg., You sit for a 30 minute reading time and you get a call from your friend with whom you hadn't spoken in a while.
This might look like a one off scenario but in a day-to-day scenario these kinda interruptions and other distractions are unavoidable and they seem to quickly pile up. When you want to engage intellectually, sometimes you need a quiet space with least distractions.
In spite of all these, some people are supercharged and they do seem to accomplish everything they want to ( intentionality converting into actions ). I want to move into that zone.
But hey, i got your point and i will seriously consider your points and thanks for a great post :)
- One, make sure not to let distractions one day ruin the next day. For example, today, I ended up having to help my wife with my daughter during 10 minutes of my workout time. No biggie. I shortened that to 20 minutes, and tomorrow, I'll get back on track with 30 minutes again.
- Two, do everything you can to isolate yourself during these times. Go into another room, turn off your phone, whatever. There's almost NOTHING that can't wait 30 minutes - making that time for yourself the most important thing in the world for that time is absolutely key. There's almost nothing that gets in the way of this time for me, except perhaps something related to my wife or daughter. All others wait. Remember, only you will protect that time for yourself, take it seriously!
