🧭 THIS WEEK AT BuildProven
Howdy, a bit into claude code this week - anyone interested? or too detailed/deep? Let me know. I think my stupid reply email is a problem - u can reach me on linkedIN too.!
Note that while below seems a bit technical and you might not want to get into claude code or equivalent, the concepts and how to think about what AI can do for you apply across a lot of tools including just basic chat tools, Claude, ChatGPT etc. There, you can just upload the files and get a similar type of result. The CLI [command prompt] eventually becomes easier/quicker though.
as usual, would love it if you could share this newsletter, give feedback via the poll at the end, or best, just hit 'reply' and tell me what you need/want with AI. I will definitely reply and try to help best i can.🧰 Worth Your Click
Here are a few things I found recently:
Anthropic launched Sonnet 5, an all round ‘reasonable cost’ model
Anthropic latest/greatest/crazy expensive model Fable is back
AI Engineer keynotes on youtube!
Claude Code quickstart — the official first-session walkthrough. If you get stuck at any step above, this is the page to open next.
Advanced setup and install — the install methods (native, Homebrew, npm), the account requirements, and how to uninstall cleanly if you decide it's not for you.
🗺️ FEATURED INSIGHT
Claude Code looks like a developer tool. It runs in a terminal, the docs are full of git and repos, and the whole thing feels like it was built for someone who writes software for a living.
It wasn't built only for them. Last week I pointed it at a folder of 30 meeting-note files and had it add a one-line summary to the top of every one. That was one prompt. It took under a minute of its time, and about 30 minutes of mine including the install.
You don't need to be a developer for this. What you need is a folder of your own files and one specific, boring change you keep meaning to make across all of them. That's the job Claude Code is quietly excellent at: bulk operations on files you already own.
Here's the whole first session, start to finish. Copy the command, then type the five prompts in order.
What you need first
One thing that trips people up on install: Claude Code needs a paid Claude account (Pro, Max, or a work Team/Enterprise plan). The free Claude.ai plan doesn't include it. If you already pay for Claude, you're set.
Then pick your folder. Not a scary one. Pick a real folder of your own files where you have a repetitive change to make:
A folder of 30 meeting-note
.mdfiles [just text files with a bit nicer formatting!] that need a one-line summary at the top of eachA batch of draft documents where a project got renamed and every mention of the old name is now wrong
A pile of notes where you spelled a client's name three different ways
The change has to be specific enough that you could describe it to an assistant in one sentence. "Make these better" is not it. "Add a one-line summary to the top of each file" is.
The install (one command)
Open Terminal (on a Mac: Cmd+Space, type "Terminal", hit Enter). Paste this one line and press Enter:
curl -fsSL https://claude.ai/install.sh | bashThat's the whole install. When it finishes, close that Terminal window and open a new one so it picks up the change. Then check it worked:
claude --versionIf that prints a version number, you're done installing. If it says command not found, quit Terminal fully and reopen it — the most common cause is the old window not seeing the new install.
The five prompts, in order
Now the actual session. First, tell your terminal to move into your folder. If your files live in a folder called meeting-notes inside your Documents:
cd ~/Documents/meeting-notesThen start Claude Code by typing one word and pressing Enter:
claudeThe first time, it opens your browser to log in to your Claude account. Do that once and you're in. Now you're talking to it in plain English. Type these five prompts one at a time, reading each answer before you send the next.
Prompt 1 — get your bearings. Do not skip this.
Don't change anything yet. List the files in this folder and tell me what
kind of files they are and roughly how many. I want to understand what
you can see before I ask you to do anything.This is the seatbelt. It confirms Claude Code is looking at the folder you think it is, before it touches a single file.
Prompt 2 — describe the change, still read-only.
Still don't change anything. I want to add a one-line plain-English
summary to the very top of each .md file, describing what that meeting
was about. Tell me your plan: which files you'd edit, and show me what
the summary line would look like for two of them so I can check the
style first.You're making it show its work before it does the work. If the sample summaries are wrong, you fix the instruction now, while it's free.
Prompt 3 — make the change on ONE file first.
Good. Do exactly that, but on ONE file only to start — pick the first
one. Add the summary line at the top, save it, then show me the before
and after so I can confirm it's right.One file. Always one file first. You are checking the result on something small before you let it run across all thirty.
Prompt 4 — run it across the whole folder.
That's exactly right. Now do the same to every other .md file in this
folder, the same way. When you're done, give me a list of every file you
changed.That list is your receipt. It tells you exactly what it touched, no guessing.
Prompt 5 — the proof, and the undo.
Show me the full before-and-after for one more file so I can spot-check,
and tell me in plain English how I'd undo all of these changes if I
decided I didn't want them.The last half matters as much as the first. Before you trust a tool with a folder of real work, you want to know the exit. (If your folder is tracked in git, the undo is git checkout . — Claude Code will tell you. If it's not, you keep a copy of the folder first, which is the honest fallback: duplicate the folder in Finder before Prompt 4.)
The wrong way to ask, and the right way
The single biggest thing that separates a useful session from a frustrating one is how specific you are. Watch the difference.
Don't say:
Clean up my meeting notes.It'll ask you what you mean, or worse, guess — reformatting, rewording, "improving" things you never asked it to touch.
Say:
Add a one-line summary to the top of each .md file. Change nothing else.
Show me before and after.Same tool. The second one gives it a single, checkable job with a built-in proof step. You're not being polite to a robot. You're writing a work instruction the way you'd write one for a sharp new hire: exactly what, on which files, and show me when you're done.
The proof — what actually changed
Here's what one of my files looked like before and after, so you know what you're aiming for:
# Q2 Planning — 2026-06-11
+ > Summary: Locked the Q2 roadmap, cut two features, moved the launch to August.
Attendees: ...
- Agreed to drop the referral feature for now
- Launch date moved from July to AugustThat one line at the top, added to every file, is the entire job. No app, no code you have to understand, no new tool to learn on top of the one you just installed. A specific, boring, useful change, made across a whole folder, with a diff you can read to confirm it did what you asked.
Weekly build logs from a 25-year program manager who codes with AI.
— Brett
👉 Hit “Reply” and share your experience — I read every one!