DEV Community: shipra

5 Common Prompt Mistakes (and How to Fix Them)

shipra — Wed, 21 Oct 2026 07:37:16 +0000

Why your prompt matters

Prompt is what you gave to AI chatbot or the question or instruction you gave to AI to get a response out of it.

Vague or clumsy prompt will give vague or clumsy response. The clearer prompt the better the response.

Let's look at some common mistakes.

Mistake 1: Being too vague

Before: Explain a maths theorem.
After: Explain Pythagoras theorem to a ten year old kid, with simple everyday example.
Why this works: The AI knows which topic to cover and how to explain it.

Mistake 2: Giving no context

Before: Write a cover letter
After: Write a cover letter for an engineer with 4+ years experience in web development, transitioning into tech writing.
Why this works: The AI knows who you are, what you do and can reply in a way that fits your situation.

Mistake 3: Not specifying the format

Before: Give me yoga postures.
After: Give me 5 yoga postures for begineers in bulleted list with one sentence each.
Why this works: AI provides response in a specific format which user asked, response is easy and short to understand.

Mistake 4: Asking too many things at once

Before: Why is the sun hot? Why is earth round? How many galaxies are in the entire universe? How many black holes are discovered? What is a black hole?
After: Why is sun hot?
Why this works: AI chatbot can focus on one question, instead of getting confused or giving rushed response for each.

Mistake 5: Not telling the AI who it’s talking to

Before: What's perimeter of a rectangle?
After: Assume you are talking to a 12-year-old. Explain the perimeter of a rectangle to a 12-year-old using a simple example.
Why this works: AI chatbot focuses on simple answer, choosing examples which fit the reader better.

Conclusion

Better prompt means better responses from chatbot. Be specific, give context, name the format, ask one thing at a time and say who the answer is for.

What is Cybersecurity? Everyday threats explained simply.

shipra — Wed, 21 Oct 2026 06:49:37 +0000

Have you ever received a suspicious SMS link saying - "Click the link to win an iPhone." My friend received it and, she clicked on it. Hackers asked for an OTP, by evening she lost 2 lakhs from her account.
This is a cyberattack.
Cybersecurity is how we protect ourselves from such incidents.

What is cybersecurity?

Cybersecurity is the practice which protects our devices, accounts from cyberattacks.

Take the analogy of locking the door. We lock to keep strangers out.
Similarly we use passwords to protect our bank account, clouds, emails from cyberattack.

Why does it matter?

Information is the biggest weapon.
If someone gets hold of our passwords, they can access our private photos, empty our bank accounts, misuse our credit card.
Data leaks affect millions of people worldwide with their information sold on dark web.
For example: In 2026, a dark web service named Nexus claimed to sell scans of 153 million license cards of USA/Canadian citizens. (Source: Krebs on Security / TechSpot).

Common threats and ways to avoid them

Let's look at some common threats and what can be done to avoid them.

Phishing

Sending fake messages or link to someone to extract personal information is the biggest cyberattack against general public. The SMS my friend received was a phishing attack.
How to avoid it :
Never open any unidentified SMS or email link and never share OTP with anyone.

Weak passwords

Nowadays while setting up passwords, we are required to use minimum length, number, symbols and letters.
The stronger the password the lower the chances of hacking. A weak password is short or easy to guess, like 123456
How to avoid it:
Make sure your password is strong, and never share your password with anyone.
Turn on 2FA whenever possible.

Public Wi-Fi

Imagine you go to Starbucks to get your favorite cappuccino, and connect open free public WiFi. Public WiFi is unsecure and hacker on same network can see what you are doing and can set up a fake hotspot .
How to avoid it:
Never use unauthorized public wifi.
Use mobile data or VPN instead.

What to do if you are hacked?

Act quickly Change your passwords, log out of all the devices, block your sim card or credit/debit card.
Report the incident In India call 1930, to report cyberattack crime at cybercrime.gov.in.
Never pay a hacker Don't pay ransom to hacker, instead try to control the damage caused.

Conclusion

In future if technology exists so are malicious intents. Awareness and keeping updated with technology are the some of the ways to protect from cyber crimes. Do not click unknown links, use strong passwords with 2FA, and avoid public Wi-Fi for banking.

Difference among SaaS, PaaS, IaaS explained.

shipra — Wed, 21 Oct 2026 06:39:07 +0000

What's cloud computing? Let's understand it with a pizza analogy.

In simple terms, cloud computing is a place where instead of buying expensive servers, one can rent them over the internet.

Owning servers has massive disadvantages. They are expensive, difficult to maintain and generate lots of heat.
That's where cloud computing comes in.
Cloud servers only need an internet connection. They can host your favourite movies(Netflix) or store images/videos of your pet.

Types of cloud computing

There are three types of cloud computing: IaaS, PaaS, SaaS.
A pizza analogy will help explain the difference.

IaaS - Here servers are provided by giant platforms - like AWS EC2. Entire OS along with code, networks etc has to be installed by you.
-You go to the kitchen, bring your dough, topping, sauce. Restaurant will provide you an oven.
PaaS - Everything is provided by cloud companies (Microsoft, Google, Amazon) including server, networks, OS. You only have to bring the code. An example is Heroku.
You walk into the kitchen where the base and sauce are ready. You bring only your toppings.
SaaS - Back in the day, there was a floppy disk or CD to install software on our desktop. Since invention of the cloud things have become easier - to use the services one must have an account. The software sits on cloud, it can be free of cost like "Gmail" or it can come with monthly subscription like "Netflix".
you go to the restaurant and eat ready-made pizza.

Which type provides more control?

IaaS provides the most control. You get the server and the rest is yours to manage.
PaaS provides intermediate control with just your code, the rest being provided.
SaaS provides the least control with ready-made services to use.

What are the top cloud computing platforms?

Microsoft has Azure
Google has Google Cloud Platform
Amazon has AWS

All three offer IaaS, PaaS, SaaS services.

Why do businesses use cloud computing?

Many apps and websites are hosted on the cloud.

Cost: Ready-made servers are available for hosting which reduces the cost of setting up servers.
Scale: If more users arrive, you can add server capacity quickly.
Access: You can reach your servers from anywhere with an internet connection.
Speed: A new server is ready in minutes, not weeks.

Which one would you choose?

It depends on how much control you need.
Least control - SaaS
Intermediate control - PaaS
Almost full control - IaaS

Pros of shifting career from Coding to Writing

shipra — Wed, 07 Oct 2026 06:49:04 +0000

Let me put forward by saying, I absolutely love to code. I wanted to try something which helps people to understand the product better and thats where writing comes in.

Is Writing Really a “Lesser” Job?

Although coding is the backbone of any project, writing is as important. Writing caters to the general audience who is unaware of technical jargon.

The audience is the people who actually use the product. Of course, a product has to be built before anyone can use it, and that is where coders come in. The purpose of writing is to make the product easier for users, which in turn helps improve profit margins.

Why Good Docs Matter to a Business?

A good document indirectly improves the sales of a product. If the document is poorly written, users lose interest in project, further disapproving it, giving lesser recommendations and eventually switching to rivalry product.

What I Enjoy Most About Writing?

Writing gives me a chances to put my inner thoughts on a paper in relation to product. Since I have been a web developer myself, I enjoy the process of how the product work flows, how pieces are connected with each other. To explain a small piece of error to user without unnecessary complex terms while keeping it polite and professional gives me real satisfaction.

Where I Want to Go Next!

I wanna help people to understand a project, I am looking forward to start my career in writing.
Code builds the product, Writers help people to use it.