Building with AI

I’m using AI to build my first custom WordPress theme and the progress has been incredible.

I started with a design and close to zero knowledge about theme building. It’s been a few days and I already have all the hardest parts out of the way.

This would have taken me 3-4 weeks without AI. Looking back at the old way of doing things seems so archaic and cumbersome.

Reading documentation. Trying something out. Hitting a roadblock. Searching Google. Reading through a blog post to find your answer. Trying again. Still not getting it and trying all over again.

I can’t go back!

With a combination of tools I cut out so much back and forth. I learned a ton along the way too.

My workflow looked like this:

1. Start with ChatGPT to understand what I need to do. Sometimes get code snippets.
2. Start implementing something.
3. Search Google with a very direct question.
4. Get the answer in the AI summary and keep building.
5. Use Cursor to knock out any lose ends and fix hairy bugs.

Rinse and repeat a few times over and here we are. Full of confidence. Ready for whatever comes next.