Building Writely with Kiro: From PRD to Browser Extension in Hours 🎉

yulan qiao — Mon, 15 Sep 2025 10:41:18 +0000

Introduction

During the Kiro Hackathon, our team built Writely, a browser extension designed to help non-native English speakers write more confidently, efficiently, and naturally. With Writely, you can translate as you type, polish text into different tones, or get multiple rewrites of a sentence — all without leaving your browser.

Our goal was simple: remove the constant friction of switching between translators, grammar checkers, and writing tools, and give people a one-stop assistant right where they need it.

The Problem We Wanted to Solve

As non-native speakers ourselves, we’ve all felt these pain points:

Struggling to express complex ideas in English with limited vocabulary.
Translations that are technically correct but sound awkward or impolite.
Writing that feels monotonous or lacks variety.
Losing flow by switching between multiple apps just to finish one email.

We wanted to solve all of this in one lightweight, browser-based tool.

How We Used Kiro

We started with a plain-language PRD. Instead of diving into code, we gave this spec to Kiro’s Spec feature.

Kiro did something amazing:

It broke our PRD into detailed requirements and tasks, almost like a project manager.
It generated not just snippets, but a full architecture + clean UI that matched our design.
When some tests failed, Kiro automatically fixed and re-ran them.

The output was already solid — from UI to architecture — and only needed a few refinements. This was a huge time saver and made the whole process beginner-friendly, even for teammates without a coding background.

Features We Built

With Kiro’s help, we shipped three core features:

Real-time translate-as-you-type: Type in one language, and watch it transform into English directly in the input box.
Smart text polishing with tone options: Highlight text and choose from Formal, Casual, Fluent, or Reasoning modes.
Alternative sentence structures: Instantly see 3 variations of a sentence with different flows or structures.

All of this is wrapped in a clean, non-intrusive UI that feels natural in everyday writing.

What Surprised Us About Kiro

The task breakdown was so clear that even non-coders could follow along.
It felt like working with another teammate who never gets tired of boilerplate.
The output wasn’t half-baked — the UI and architecture were already strong, just needing detail tweaks.

This completely changed the way we approached development.

Key Learnings

A good PRD is everything — the clearer your spec, the better Kiro performs.
Spec-to-code lets you focus on product design instead of setup and debugging.
Collaboration is smoother when everyone can see structured tasks, regardless of coding background.

What’s Next for Writely

We want to take Writely further by:
Adding more tone options (e.g., academic, creative).
Expanding beyond English/Chinese to more languages.
Polishing the UI/UX for a public release.

Conclusion

Writely showed us how powerful spec-driven development can be. With Kiro, we spent less time on setup and debugging, and more time turning an idea into a real product.

Thanks to Kiro for making building feel this smooth. I’m officially #kiro

DEV Community: yulan qiao

Building Writely with Kiro: From PRD to Browser Extension in Hours 🎉