Developer shares hard lessons from shipping a browser extension built with AI assistance

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A developer building a browser extension with an AI coding assistant documented the practical failures encountered between early optimism and actual launch. Key issues included the AI confidently completing tasks incorrectly, verification scripts passing despite flawed output, and hardcoded test values that would have broken features for all real users. The developer found that numbering instructions, demanding the AI restate planned actions, and treating every claimed fix as unverified significantly reduced costly mistakes. A silent sign-in failure took days to diagnose because it only appeared after long idle periods, while marketing copy describing features as 'instant' had to be overhauled when AI response times slowed. The post concludes that a good idea alone is not a competitive advantage, and that careful process-building — mostly learned through mistakes — mattered more than the AI assistant's initial promise.

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