Full Tutorial: A 3-Step System to Build Production Apps with AI | Ryan Carson
Use Ryan's proven 3-file system (spec → atomic tasks → automated tests) to build production apps using AI without frustration
Dear subscribers,
Today, I want to share a new episode with Ryan Carson.
Ryan is a serial founder who has built a proven 3-file system to vibe code production apps that has 5,000+ stars on GitHub. In our interview, he demoed how to build a new product using his AI templates to create a spec, generate atomic tasks, and run automated tests. We also had a great chat about how to start a solo AI business.
Watch now on YouTube, Apple, and Spotify.
Ryan and I talked about:
(00:00) Why his 3-file AI coding workflow works so well
(03:22) Explaining each file: PRD, atomic tasks, test-driven development
(08:02) Live demo: Building a new feature from scratch
(22:32) How to practice test-driven development to avoid bugs
(34:18) How to get AI to be your tutor to become more technical
(42:03) Pain pills vs vitamins: Why divorce is a great AI business
(45:23) How to start a one-person company with AI’s help
Thanks to Bolt for sponsoring today’s newsletter
Vibe coding tools often create prototypes that are fragile and error-prone. I’ve gotten to know Eric (Bolt’s founder) over the past year and he’s always wanted to fix this.
Bolt v2 comes with support for AI agents like Claude Code and Codex directly in the browser. This means fewer errors, smarter to-do lists, and production-ready infra (DBs, auth, payments, hosting) via Bolt Cloud. Try out Bolt v2 for free below:
Top 10 takeaways I learned from this episode
One-person AI companies let you control your time. Ryan chose to start his new business solo after a previous exit where he led 100 employees. “Being a venture-funded Silicon Valley founder is insane. You’ve got a board and 100s of employees. The ultimate wealth is controlling your time and taking care of your family.” The solo founder bootstrap path is more viable now than ever.
Use Ryan’s 3-file system to vibe code without frustration. Ryan built 3 separate markdown files that you can tag in Cursor or another AI coding app to drastically reduce bugs and errors while vibe coding:
create-prd.md to generate detailed requirements.
generate-tasks.md to break the PRD into parent and child tasks.
process-task-list.md to execute and write tests for one task at a time.
Here’s a link to the GitHub repo where you can download all 3 files: