How 4 Senior Engineers Use AI to Ship Faster

Niki Lubomirov — Mon, 12 May 2025 18:17:13 +0000

I was sick of watching yet another glossy keynote where somebody types “Hello World” into ChatGPT and calls it a case study.
AI hype is a mile wide, but the part that’s actually usable in production is still an inch deep—and that inch is where I spend my time as a founder.

After a dozen hallway arguments and one depressing conference panel, I decided to try something different: run a workshop that shows, line by line, how super experienced developers AI power users show how it's done.

Not in theory. Not in marketing decks. In editors, terminals, and pipelines.

That idea grew into conf.ai, a one‑day, four‑session, hands‑on workshop that streams live this Friday, May 16 (GMT+3). I genuinely want feedback about the whole thing.

Why another AI event?

Because most AI events aren’t for builders.

The pattern is familiar: vendor talks, abstract slides, a feel‑good panel about “the future of work,” and maybe a demo that quietly skips the messy parts. Developers leave with swag and no clue how to integrate the shiny new thing into an actual repo.

What we’re doing instead

4 real deal senior developers who write production code for a living.
No "AI evangelists" and "AI Influencers". No sponsored bullsh*t.
Live coding in Cursor, other AI IDEs and terminals.
A Discord back‑channel for additional support from the trainers.

Here's brief overview of the 4 workshops:

Workshop 1: AI Project Planning & Execution

Milko Slavov, CTO of two AI startups, will walk you through the full AI-powered architectural and development process he uses daily to deliver working software.

He will demonstrate:

How to generate PRDs and specs using ChatGPT
UI prototypes (v0), context gathering, and AI deep research
Creating high-level plans and converting them into how-to guides
Implementation using Cursor’s AI Agent
Automated refactoring, testing, and commit logic
Building a feature/MVP through to deployment with CI/CD

This won’t be just a demo—it’s the actual working process of a CTO, with analysis at every step.

Workshop 2: Full-Cycle AI Dev: From Zero to Deployed

Jemal Ahmedov leads teams that ship incredibly fast, leveraging AI to the max. In this session, you’ll see how a final product moves from idea to deployment entirely within Cursor.

Workshop details:

Project initialization, repo setup, README
Setting up Cursor: .rules file, custom plugins
Product backlog generation via AI – user stories + criteria
Micro-design for each feature
Implementing end-to-end vertical slices of the project
Instant AI refactoring and optimization
Code review with advanced Critical Thinking prompts
Shift-left testing + early unit/integration tests
Debugging and runtime fixes
Final tests + smoke tests
Auto commit and push, CI/CD deployment (+ MCP servers)
Post-deploy sanity check

Bonus: every participant will receive “Ultimate Guide to Mastering Cursor.”

Workshop 3: Cursor in Action: Shipping Real Features in Production Code

Yavor Belakov, co-founder and AI engineer at Team-GPT (with over 50,000 users), will implement an actual new feature in their product.

Focus on:

Working within an existing codebase
Strategies for implementing a new feature with AI
Active audience participation – you’ll help make decisions with him
From idea to staging deployment

You’ll see how a full social media post generation tool is built using context, and how it ends up in production-ready code.

Workshop 4: Beyond Cursor: Advanced AI Dev Tooling & Stack Management

Martin Kuvandzhiev, CEO of Encorp.ai and a software engineer with experience in the blockchain industry and scalable enterprise solutions, will showcase the latest AI development strategies.

Expect:

How to choose the right AI tools for the context (it's not all about Cursor)
Working with Augment Code, Cline, Firebase Studio
Complex use cases and AI approaches for production code

The event will be mainly focused on Cursor, but other AI dev tools will be showcased too:

Pricing (and why it’s not “free to community”)

245 EUR isn’t nothing — but compared to flying out to a conference, sitting through vendor pitches, and getting a tote bag, it’s a solid trade. It’s ~5% of a dev’s monthly salary for workflows you can actually use.

Teams of 20+ get group pricing to spare managers 20 expense reports.

We’re also building a company around this. This event is just the start — we want to keep shipping practical workshops. Charging fairly keeps us independent and focused on what actually works.

Logistics snapshot

Date & Time – Friday, 16 May 2025, 09:30‑18:00 GMT+3 (Sofia)
Where – Online, recordings will be also available
Who should join – Mid‑senior devs, Tech Leads, Engineering Managers, CTOs
Language – English
Link – conf.ai

The ask

Skim the agenda. Poke holes. Call BS where you see it.

And if you want in, grab a seat before Friday, we've got some spots left; I’m capping attendance so Q&A doesn’t turn into a Twitch chat.