ArtificialIntelligence - Proto Typing Too

AI retrieval pipeline discards a valid building match before it reaches the model.

Your AI Isn’t Stupid.

When an AI agent gives the wrong answer, the model may not be the problem. A real debugging story shows why developers should check what the model actually received before rewriting the prompt.

Illustration of a red Save button, a green "Saved Successfully" message, and a "Missed Schedule" stamp, showing how software can appear successful while quietly failing.

Trust Signals in Software

The blog about "The Save Button That Doesn't" missed its own scheduled publish date. You can't make this stuff up.

Blue, a small robot, skips across stepping stones while pieces of conversation context disappear beneath the stream.

Your AI Doesn't Experience the Time Between Your Questions

Illustration of how ChatGPT and generative AI process conversations as successive interactions rather than experiencing continuous time, using stepping stones and a river of lost context to explain AI context loss and conversational memory.

Cluttered engineering workbench covered with tools, coffee cups, schematics and wires, with a partially buried wrench highlighted by a subtle blue glow.

The AI Didn't Forget.

AI doesn’t always forget instructions. Sometimes the context window gets overloaded. Two very different AI workflows reveal the same problem - and why managing context matters.

Jana sits on a giant mushroom with a laptop and coffee as smoke curls into several small robots.

Replacements?

After being laid off, I’m helping build an AI version of myself to preserve decades of institutional knowledge. But how much can AI capture before knowledge gives way to judgment?

Carpenter given a pocketknife while his professional tools remain locked away.

It’s 2026, Not 2016

Technical interviews still test experienced developers on memory and syntax, even as real-world development increasingly depends on judgment, problem-solving, and intelligent use of modern tools. Prateek Sharma asks whether it’s time for the interview process to catch up.

A computer monitor displays a huge Excel spreadsheet named "JANAs-spreadsheet-COPY-203.xlsx," representing the business-critical spreadsheet everyone is afraid to change.

The Spreadsheet Everyone Was Afraid to Touch

A temporary spreadsheet built to save time became a business-critical system that outlived its creator. A funny story about institutional knowledge hiding in plain sight.

Computer screen showing multiple spreadsheet files named Budget_FINAL, Budget_FINAL_v2, Budget_FINAL_v2_REAL, and Budget_FINAL_v2_REAL_THISONE, illustrating version-control workarounds.

Version Control for Normal Humans

Why do so many shared drives contain files named FINAL_v2_REAL_THISONE.xlsx? It isn't bad file naming. It's how people adapt when software doesn't match the way work actually gets done.

Illustration of a project manager on vacation while an AI assistant handles routine project questions, highlighting the value of captured knowledge and documentation.

The Vacation Test

A 35-day vacation, an AI clone, and the real lesson about knowledge capture. AI doesn't replace experience. It depends on it.

2 office workers chat by a server rack used like a water cooler. A monitor above joins the conversation, showing how an AI assistant can feel like a coworker after repeated interactions.

The New Work Relationship

We spend years teaching computers to communicate like people. Then we accidentally start treating them like coworkers. Why the relationship change has more to do with us than AI.

A traveler uses a smartphone while airport workers prepare an aircraft outside, illustrating that people still perform most of the work behind modern travel.

Typewriters. ATMs. AI?

What do the printing press, the typewriter, the ATM, and AI have in common? Every one sparked predictions of widespread job losses. The reality was far more interesting.

Movers carry boxes labeled with error messages from a cubicle area into an executive corner office, illustrating how automation shifts mistakes and responsibility.

The Error Moved To The Corner Office

Automation can eliminate some mistakes, but it doesn't eliminate responsibility. Often the errors just move somewhere harder to see - and more expensive to fix.

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