Vibe Architecture
In this activity, try to think about what software you might be able to build if you could build anything. You are not limited by your skills, only your imagination!
Part One: Blue Sky Brainstorming (15m)
Think about what you might want to make. The only criteria is that it has to be software. Utilize the blue sky thinking technique - basically, there are no bad ideas. You may find later that there certainly are bad ideas, but to start, pretend there could never be a bad idea.
Here are some software ideas:
- A game
- A social media app
- A personal website
- An immersive art piece
Part Two: Engineering (15m)
The next part is where skills are required. It may be tempting to just say "hey ChatGPT build my idea" but that's not always going to work!
Luckily, A.I. is pretty good at figuring out how to do something if it knows what it's doing very specifically.
- Go to ChatGPT
- Give it your ideas
- Ask it about feasibility
- Ask it about frameworks
- Ask it about architecture
- Ask it about tools
- Ask it to teach you about these things
- Ask it how you can get started
Note that none of this is Vibe Coding, because it does not involve code at all - it's more like creating plans / blueprints.
Part Three: Implementation (15m)
Now for the part where you try to actually bring something into existence. This is where it gets especially tricky, because you may have to download / install software or actually get something up and running. You might be able to host your project in HyTOP, but most software applications require a bit more than just front-end HTML/CSS/JS or front-end Python.
That said, ask ChatGPT to give you some code, and see what happens! If things aren't working, go back and ask how to fix them.
Side-note: Context
Context is extremely important when speaking with chatbots. In fact, since LLMs are basically just giant auto-completes, the context you provide does a lot to determine output. Some important items to provide:
- Your experience level with different technologies
- Your goals in building your piece of software / learning
- The capabilities of HyTOP and your current computer
- The software you have downloaded / installed
Conclusion
Hopefully, by the end of this activity, you will have some idea of the power AND the limitations of an A.I. software development workflow. You might even have something cool to show, even if it's just a prototype or one piece of something larger!