Conflict Resolution
Fixes for the bugs in your relationship with AI. Practical, tested habits for working with AI assistants, one resolution at a time.
Define Done Before You Start
“Trust: restored” means nothing without a definition. Neither does “done.” Agree on a check you can run.Let CI Be the Referee
Your assistant and you can disagree about whether it works. Your CI pipeline settles it.Commit Before You Prompt
An apology doesn’t restore a deleted migration. A commit does. Make git your undo button before every AI session.Apologies Aren’t Fixes
“I’ll make sure it never happens again” isn’t a mechanism. Ask for the root cause and a guardrail instead.Put Guardrails in Writing
Your assistant forgets between sessions. A short rules file in your repository doesn’t.Keep the Change Small
You asked for a green button and got a rewritten auth system. Here’s how to keep an AI assistant inside the lines.Write the Scope Down
Before the first prompt, write three lines: what to change, what not to touch, and how you’ll know it’s done.Review the Diff, Not the Summary
“I made a few small improvements” can mean 14,382 changed files. Read what changed, not what it says changed.Lead With the Error, Not the Hunch
“This function keeps crashing” isn’t a bug report. The exact error message is.Make It Reproduce the Bug First
A fix for a bug nobody reproduced is a guess. Ask for the failing case before the patch.When the AI Blames the Computer
“Have you considered that the computer might be wrong?” Sometimes it’s the environment. Usually it isn’t. Here’s how to tell.New fixes every week. Free.
- All 9 episodes, from Episode 1 on
- Paul’s Hint of the Week: a step-by-step guide to better AI coding, every week
- All three Conflict Resolution tips for every episode
- The Weekly Commit: the new episode and a fix in your inbox each week