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How I AIDIY dev tools: How this engineer created “Flowy” to visualize his plans and accelerate coding
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Episode Details
EPISODE INFO
- Released
- February 9, 2026
- Duration
- 53m
- Channel
- How I AI
- Watch on YouTube
- ▶ Open ↗
EPISODE DESCRIPTION
CJ Hess is a software engineer at Tenex who has built some of the most useful tools and workflows for being a “real AI engineer.” In this episode, CJ demonstrates his custom-built tool, Flowy, that transforms Claude’s ASCII diagrams into interactive visual mockups and flowcharts. He also shares his process for using model-to-model comparison to ensure that his AI-generated code is high-quality, and why he believes we’re just at the beginning of a revolution in how developers interact with AI. *What you’ll learn:*
- How CJ built Flowy, a custom visual planning tool that converts JSON files into interactive mockups and flowcharts
- Why visual planning tools are more effective than ASCII diagrams for complex UI and animation workflows
- How to create and use Claude Code skills to extend your development environment
- Using model-to-model comparison (Claude + Codex) to improve code quality
- How to build your own ecosystem of tools around Claude Code
- The value of bypassing permissions in controlled environments to speed up development
*Brought to you by:* Orkes—The enterprise platform for reliable applications and agentic workflows: https://www.orkes.io/ Rovo—AI that knows your business: https://rovo.com/ *Detailed workflow walkthroughs from this episode:*
- How I AI: CJ Hess on Building Custom Dev Tools and Model-vs-Model Code Reviews: https://www.chatprd.ai/how-i-ai/cj-hess-tenex-custom-dev-tools-and-model-vs-model-code-reviews
- Implement Model-vs-Model AI Code Reviews for Quality Control: https://www.chatprd.ai/how-i-ai/workflows/implement-model-vs-model-ai-code-reviews-for-quality-control
- Develop Features with AI Using Custom Visual Planning Tools: https://www.chatprd.ai/how-i-ai/workflows/develop-features-with-ai-using-custom-visual-planning-tools
*In this episode, we cover:* (00:00) Introduction to CJ Hess (02:48) Why CJ prefers Claude Code for development (04:46) The evolution of developer environments with AI (06:50) Planning workflows and the limitations of ASCII diagrams (08:23) Introduction to Flowy, CJ’s custom visualization tool (11:54) How Flowy compares to mermaid diagrams (15:25) Demo: Using Flowy (19:30) Examining Flowy’s skill structure (23:27) Reviewing the generated flowcharts and diagrams (28:34) The cognitive benefits of visual planning vs. text-based planning (31:38) Generating UI mockups with Flowy (33:30) Building the feature directly from flowcharts and mockups (35:40) Quick recap (36:51) Using model-to-model review with Codex (Carl) (41:52) The benefits of using AI for code review (45:13) Lightning round and final thoughts *Tools referenced:*
- Claude Code: https://claude.ai/code
- Claude Opus 4.5: https://www.anthropic.com/news/claude-opus-4-5
- Cursor: https://cursor.sh/
- Obsidian: https://obsidian.md/
- GPT-5.2 Codex: https://openai.com/index/introducing-gpt-5-2-codex/
- Google’s Project Genie: https://labs.google/projectgenie
*Other references:*
- Mermaid diagrams: https://mermaid.js.org/
- Figma: https://www.figma.com/
- Excalidraw: https://excalidraw.com/
- TypeScript: https://www.typescriptlang.org/
*Where to find CJ Hess:* LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cj-hess-connexwork/ X: https://x.com/seejayhess *Where to find Claire Vo:* ChatPRD: https://www.chatprd.ai/ Website: https://clairevo.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/clairevo/ X: https://x.com/clairevo _Production and marketing by https://penname.co/._ _For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email jordan@penname.co._
SPEAKERS
CJ Hess
guestClaire Vo
host
EPISODE SUMMARY
In this episode of How I AI, featuring CJ Hess and Claire Vo, DIY dev tools: How this engineer created “Flowy” to visualize his plans and accelerate coding explores Engineer builds Flowy to turn AI plans into visual artifacts CJ Hess shares an AI-native development workflow that upgrades traditional markdown planning by adding visual flowcharts and UI mockups generated from a JSON schema in his custom tool, Flowy.
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