From idea to working product

Keeps business logins, passwords and files separate from family stuff.

Name it after your company. Every app gets its own folder inside it later. You will need this.

You are about to create eight or more accounts. Keep every login in one safe place.

Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini, Grok or Perplexity. Three or four for the first month if you can give it real time, then cancel the extras.

An AI browser that does the busywork across websites for you. Use my link for a discount: [link and promo code].

GitHub, Cursor, Supabase, Vercel, Sentry and PostHog. Start with Vercel for a Next.js app unless you later have a specific infrastructure reason not to. Ask Polar to do it with you.

Tell Polar to connect those services to Cursor and to the AI you use most.

A skill is a reusable set of instructions your AI can apply automatically when it becomes relevant. Different tools may call these skills, project instructions, custom instructions, agents or memory. Set up the builder skills once so you do not have to remember a /skill command every time.

For you, your kids, your pets, your plants, your home, your work. Things that are missing or annoying.

Don't judge yet. Just write.

Example: "I'm tired of figuring out what to make for lunch every day." That becomes a family meal planner: who likes what, household allergies, a weekly shopping list, and lunch and dinner ideas.

Not a minimum one. The first version should remove a real problem the first time someone uses it.

"Working parents of picky eaters," not "everyone."

Do you know this market? Do you personally know people in it?

Ask about the problem, not your idea. "What's the hardest part of lunches?" beats "Would you use my app?"

Where do they already spend time? Groups, creators, schools, forums, your own videos.

If you can't say it simply, the idea isn't clear yet.

Write down every app that does something similar.

Have your AI read Reddit and app reviews and tell you what people love, hate and keep asking for.

How it looks, how it works, who it's for.

Keep it. You'll use it in every prompt after this.

iPhone and Android, or only one? iPad or tablet too? Or desktop with a mobile companion?

Quick check-ins on the phone? Long sessions at a desk? A shared family iPad on the counter?

Just one person, a family, a team, or public?

No login and stored on the phone? The person's own cloud? Your server? Collect only what you actually need.

Camera, photos, notifications, location, contacts. Only ask for what a feature truly needs.

Write what you love about each: colors, fonts, buttons, how clear it feels.

Playful or serious? Minimal or busy? Quiet or loud? Lots of personality or calm?

Add them to your cart and download them to your computer so you can use them in your app or site.

You'll get colors, fonts and a first screen you can look at.

Your idea, who it's for, your research, the shape and the design direction.

Have the AI summarize the stable project context and save it to memory or project instructions when the tool supports that. If it cannot, copy the block it gives you and paste it into the tool's persistent instructions yourself.

Take the options that make it stronger and harder to copy.

Ask for HTML mockups and look at them on your phone.

Check that the domain and App Store name are free.

Inside your company folder, make a folder called yourapp-app.

Choose Open Project and select the folder you just made.

A repo is the safe home for your code, with every version saved. Ask Polar: "I need to create a repo for an app I'm building called ___."

So every change you make can be saved to GitHub.

A commit is a save point. You can always go back to it.

The same chat where you locked in the idea. Don't start a new one.

The important details that matter most to you.

Ask it to create the markdown files that describe your app.

What each needs for what you're building. It may add or remove things. Always ask why.

Now Cursor and every AI can read the same blueprint.

Every word on screen lives in a translation file, not in the code. Adding Spanish later becomes easy.

From one set of colors, so both always match.

Text grows when someone sets bigger text on their phone.

Labels for screen readers, strong contrast, buttons big enough to tap. Add whatever else your people need.

Ask your AI to write the Cursor prompt in small steps.

Usually 30 to 90 seconds. Test only what changed. Save the full app checklist for milestones.

That's your undo button.

Don't describe it. Paste it.

Catches the messes before they pile up.

Let the AI do the repeatable checks. You only do a quick spot check when it actually needs your eyes.

If the data can live on the phone, it may not need a server at all.

So people can only ever see their own data.

Keep them in a .env file that GitHub ignores. Ask Cursor to set this up.

Apple requires account deletion for apps with accounts.

Before anyone else touches it.

You'll see crashes and errors before users tell you.

See what people actually use, and give them an easy way to send feedback.

TestFlight for iPhone, a preview link for web.

And watch at least one person use it without helping them.

This is a milestone check, not an every-change chore. Use the real app yourself, then run the meticulous QA review before sharing it more widely.

Start with Vercel for a Next.js app. Only choose different infrastructure when you have a specific reason to.

Apple Developer account, App Store Connect, screenshots, privacy details.

Then share it everywhere else.