DEV Community: Walker Wolfson

Centaur v Cyborg... Being a Fisherman

Walker Wolfson — Sun, 23 Aug 2026 20:32:04 +0000

Disclaimer: This was written by a human, no AI was used in this process :)

The type of AI user you are can vary, just like people. I recently stumbled upon the debate of Centaur v Cyborg and it inspired me to look in the mirror and ask the question to myself, am I a Centaur or a Cyborg? I pondered on this question for a while and came to the conclusion… I am a Fisherman… I will explain.

Feel free to take this entry with a grain of sale, it is through my own practical experience using AI at Work at an enterprise level. I believe the debate of Centaur v Cyborg is particularly intriguing because the practices of prompt engineering are so nuanced and depending on the user and how that user learns and works best will entirely depend which side you lean towards.

As I begun using AI more and more, my ways of working and the type of user I was certainly leaned to being a Centaur. I enjoy writing, and there is nothing like writing a long context-rich bulleted and detailed prompt, hitting enter, walking away, making a coffee and coming back to a fairly close result to what I was expecting. Just as much as I enjoy hitting that enter button and walking away, I also love hopping into a phone booth, closing the door somewhere, going for a walk with my dog… and absolutely rambling into my phone. I am talking a total brain dump of epic proportions, doesn’t even matter if there is 1-2 minute pauses of nothing left to say… there always is! I provide all the context I can think of, to ensure I encapsulate all of my ideas. In fact, this is often how I begin most of my projects and it works wonders.

Vice Versa, through my AI journey when my task gets more narrow and I am building out more complex systems, dashboards or even getting meticulous about UX details, the Cyborg arises. Making surgical directions also has its benefits, I tend to find my most creative ideas come out of this process. The pressure and narrow scope creates idea, this does have its downsides, I find myself going down unnecessary rabbit holes implementing designs and unnecessary functionalities purely for the woah factor.

With all that that being said, what is the goal of a Centaur or a Cyborg? Well, realistically speaking, neither of them are real and therefore I reflect on my own AI practices, techniques and ways of working and I eventually get to:

Why I am a Fisherman?

AI at work reminds me alot of fishing, the goal is clear → catch fish = success/mission complete. As a real, daily user of AI at work, the goal is clear → ideate, create, iterate (ideally not alot), implement and make impact = success/mission complete.

Depending on the project, scope of the objective I tend to always cast an extremely wide net at the beginning of the project, similar to a commercial Fisherman. Figuratively speaking, this is me blabbering into my phone or writing out a novel to start a project: casting out a massive net of context, directing the AI to get my fish.

Most Fisherman aren’t commercial though, they fish for fun, sitting on a dock and throwing out a single cast for one specific fish. Narrowing that cast, seeking a unique fish, going on a hunt, getting exactly what you are looking for → there is nothing like catching that fish, entering that prompt and getting exactly what you are looking for.

There is no right or wrong answer here, I write this to shift the conversation towards Fisherman :)

How a Non-Engineer Shipped a Production App With Claude Code

Walker Wolfson — Sun, 23 Aug 2026 00:17:56 +0000

I'm not a professional engineer. I shipped a real production app — Next.js, Supabase, Prisma, live with real users — almost entirely by directing Claude Code instead of writing the code myself.

The origin story

I was logging push-ups and pull-ups in my phone's Notes app because every calisthenics tracker I tried was either bloated with coaching programs I didn't want, or built for barbell lifting with bodyweight reps bolted on as an afterthought. So I built Nickels & Dimes: log reps or timed holds, auto-tracked PRs, and clubs where you compete with friends on a monthly leaderboard.

What the work actually felt like

Not "coding," and not quite "managing" either. It was product decisions all day — what to build, what to cut, how something should behave — and almost no time spent on how to implement it.

The skill that mattered wasn't managing the model's morale, it doesn't have any. It was being unusually clear and decisive about what I actually wanted, faster than I've ever had to be with a human collaborator. There's no async buffer where someone quietly sits with a vague ask for two days before coming back with clarifying questions. You get an attempt back in minutes, so vagueness gets punished immediately instead of eventually.

What I'd tell someone trying this for the first time

Vague requests produce vague results fast, so you find out you weren't clear in minutes, not days. Use that.
The hard part isn't the syntax, it's still product judgment: what should this actually do, and why. That part doesn't get automated.
Reviewing what got built matters more than reviewing how it got built. I couldn't audit the code line by line, so I audited outcomes obsessively instead: did the feature behave the way a real user would expect.

It's live and free at nickelsanddimes.app. If you've built something this way, or tried and it didn't click, I'd like to hear what was different about your experience.

What a Week of Tracking Calisthenics Reps Actually Looks Like

Walker Wolfson — Sat, 15 Aug 2026 19:54:33 +0000

I've been logging every push-up, pull-up, dip, and set of squats into Nickels & Dimes, the calisthenics tracker I built, for a few weeks now. Here's what one actual week of my own data looks like, and a couple things tracking it consistently has changed about how I train.

The numbers

Last 7 days:

466 total reps
245 push-ups
145 pull-ups
40 sit-ups
36 dips

Lifetime PRs so far:

Push-ups: 185
Squats: 210
Dips: 45
Pull-ups: 22
Chin-ups: 15
Plank: 3:20
Dead-hang: 1:45
Burpees: 60
Muscle-ups: 4
Pistol squats: 8

Why I'm posting this

I built Nickels & Dimes because I was logging reps in my phone's Notes app, and every tracker I tried was either bloated with coaching programs I didn't want, or built for barbell lifting with bodyweight reps bolted on as an afterthought.

The thing that's actually changed my training isn't the app itself, it's that I can see the totals instead of guessing. Some days I train hard, some days I don't train at all, and seeing that pattern laid out instead of just feeling vaguely inconsistent has made me actually fix it.

The other piece that's mattered more than I expected: clubs. You can create a public or private club and rank total reps against friends every month. Competing against people I actually know has done more for my consistency than any streak counter or badge system I've used in other apps.

It's free, live at nickelsanddimes.app, built with Next.js, Supabase, and Prisma. Genuinely curious what other people's numbers look like if you track bodyweight training rigorously -- and what's actually kept you consistent.I've been logging every push-up, pull-up, dip, and set of squats into Nickels & Dimes, the calisthenics tracker I built, for a few weeks now. Here's what one actual week of my own data looks like, and a couple things tracking it consistently has changed about how I train.

The numbers

Last 7 days:

466 total reps
245 push-ups
145 pull-ups
40 sit-ups
36 dips

What made Strava/Nike Run Club actually work for you?

Walker Wolfson — Fri, 14 Aug 2026 20:18:46 +0000

About 5 years ago I got into running because of Nike Run Club, specifically competing with family and friends. Seeing my wife's and brother's miles each month motivate me to get outside and compete.

I wanted that same thing for calisthenics and it didn't exist. Every tracker was either a weightlifting app with pushups bolted on, or a bodyweight app with zero social layer, just logging reps into a void. Ended up building my own: nickelsanddimes.app

Curious what this crowd thinks though, for people who use Strava, NRC, Whoop, whatever it is, what actually keeps you opening the app and even better, if you pay for the app or features? Would love to hear about anyones perspectives on this!

Launching on Product Hunt Today - Calisthenics Rep Tracker

Walker Wolfson — Mon, 10 Aug 2026 10:47:34 +0000

I built Nickels & Dimes, a calisthenics rep tracker with public/private clubs and PR tracking, and it's live on Product Hunt today.

I was logging reps in my Notes app like an animal. Every calisthenics tracker I found was either bloated with features I didn't need or built for weightlifting, not bodyweight work. So I built the thing I actually wanted to use.

What it does: log push-ups, pull-ups, dips, whatever bodyweight movement you're doing, and it tracks your PRs automatically. Start a club with friends and compete on a leaderboard that resets monthly. Nothing fancy, just the numbers that actually matter when you're trying to get better.

Solo project, no team. Stack is Next.js, Supabase for auth and Postgres, Prisma as the ORM, Tailwind, deployed on Vercel. I used Claude Code as my execution partner for the whole build, but every product, design, and UX call was mine. It let me move fast without hand writing every line myself, which mattered a lot doing this alone.

It's been in daily use with my own friend group for a while now. That's the only reason I trust it enough to put in front of strangers.

nickelsanddimes.app if you want to poke around, or check out the Product Hunt launch if you want to leave a comment or upvote. Happy to answer anything about the build.