Author and editorial responsibility
C. Leijon writes, reviews, and is editorially responsible for AI Programming Manual. He has worked in web and systems development for more than 20 years and also holds a degree in political science. Corrections and source challenges are handled by the same named person rather than an anonymous content team.
Why This Site Exists
AI Programming Manual exists because I wanted the resource I couldn't find: structured, practical, honest guidance on building software with AI. Not marketing, not theory — just clear explanations of what works, what doesn't, and where the real trade-offs are.
The site covers two audiences:
- Developers — Programmers who want to integrate AI into their existing workflow. The 20-chapter manual, the project tutorials, and the tool guides are written for people who already know how to build software.
- Vibe coders — People who build by describing what they want to AI, without a traditional programming background. The vibe coding guides help people who are new to building software but have clear ideas about what they want to create.
Both groups are figuring out the same thing from different directions: how to work effectively with AI as a building tool.
How This Site Was Built
This entire site — the design, the guides, the tutorials, the articles — was built by me working with Claude over about six weeks of evening and weekend sessions. It started as a translation of a Swedish manual I'd written, then grew into the 40+ page resource it is now.
I made every editorial decision: what to cover, in what order, for which audience. Claude did the heavy lifting on drafting, HTML generation, and maintaining consistency across dozens of pages. The process involved hundreds of conversational exchanges, constant iteration, and a fair amount of restructuring when early decisions turned out to be wrong.
The full story — what worked, what went wrong, and what I'd do differently — is in How This Site Was Built: A Developer and AI, Start to Finish. It's the most honest account I can give of what AI-assisted development actually looks like on a real project.
What You'll Find
- The AI Programming Manual — 20 chapters from first prompts to expert-level workflows, structured in four tiers from foundations through mastery.
- Project tutorials — Build real software with AI, step by step. Every prompt, decision, and review shown.
- Tool and workflow guides — Editors, CLI tools, TypeScript/React prompting, legacy migration, REST API development.
- Vibe coding guides — Getting started, learning paths, common mistakes, and a hands-on walkthrough for non-programmers.
- Articles — Shorter reads on how AI works, where things are heading, and behind-the-scenes case studies.
Editorial Approach
- Practical over theoretical — Real prompts, working code, concrete workflows. If it can't be demonstrated, it's not ready to publish.
- Honest about limitations — AI makes mistakes in predictable ways. This site documents those failure modes. The field guide on AI errors exists because people need that information.
- No hype — No "10x developer" claims. No promises about replacing anyone. Just what works and how to use it.
- Testable — Every technique can be tried immediately. You should see results the same day you read a guide.
Sister sites, separate audiences
AI Programming Manual is one of six sites edited by C. Leijon. Its five sister sites share editorial infrastructure and research where appropriate, but they are not interchangeable translations:
- Monkeybase serves Swedish-speaking developers working with AI-assisted code.
- Perestrojka serves non-programmers who build and maintain apps with AI.
- AI på svenska serves Swedish workplaces, professions, managers, and public-sector readers.
- AI-kreatör serves Swedish creators using AI for text, images, audio, and video.
- AI-burken serves Swedish readers running AI locally on their own hardware.
Get in Touch
Found an error? Have a topic suggestion? Want to say hello? Use the Contact page. Content corrections are especially welcome — accuracy matters more than pride.