AI Coding Tip 038 - Make the AI Ask Before It Builds

A single one-line instruction can hide a dozen hidden decisions that the AI makes without your knowledge. When you ask the AI to build a site to monitor AI progress, it fills in the blanks for you about where to host it, how to deploy it, and which technology stack to use. It does this without asking for your input, leading to a plan that may not align with your actual requirements.

All of these silent assumptions are baked into the code before you even see it, making it difficult to detect and fix later. To avoid this, use the /megaplan command to force the AI to ask you a series of structured questions before it starts writing any code. Answer each question explicitly, even if it seems obvious, because the AI may have its own default opinions.

Only after you approve the AI's answers as a short plan should you let it proceed to implementation. This process helps surface hidden decisions early, cuts down on expensive rewrites, keeps you in control of the architecture, creates a paper trail of your design decisions, and improves your thinking process. The /megaplan command is not limited to Devin's /megaplan command, but can be simulated with any AI assistant that supports a system prompt or a project-level instruction file.