Show Notes
This quick dive lays out how to stitch together AI agents like Taskmaster, Klein, Windsurf, and friends into a practical, end-to-end product workflow—not a single tool doing all the work.
Tooling landscape
- Taskmaster: acts as the product manager, keeps the team focused on priorities.
- Klein: complements with planning and orchestration (strong in memory and context handling).
- Memory Bank: the “architect brain” that keeps up-to-date project context, diagrams, and references.
- Windsurf / Windsurf Next: execution layers that run tests, implement changes, and execute tasks.
- Ader, Copilot: additional capabilities to fill gaps in analysis, coding, and automation.
- Cursor: enables browser-level interactions and integration with live web work.
- MCP (multi-tool chat bridge): lets you talk to tools like Cursor; still learning to be perfectly consistent across tools.
- The key idea: no single tool is a silver bullet. Glue the strengths of each to cover the full lifecycle.
Design philosophy and process
- Shape Up guidance matters: start with why, sketch rough solutions, time-box, and guard against rabbit holes and no-gos.
- PRD framing: use a simple template to capture what, why, and how engineers will solve it; don’t over-design upfront.
- Why first, then how: dedicate real thinking time to defining the problem and value before chasing a flashy prompt.
- Timeboxing and scope management: set a real, tester-friendly time box to avoid feature creep.
From old processes to agentic tooling
- Historical flow: conception, initiation, market analysis, design, build, test, deploy.
- Agile/lean/Google 5-day sprint: faster cycles, but not a guaranteed win for every team.
- Shape Up shift: plan in six-week rhythms, prioritize problems, and iterate on the solution without over-committing to perfect designs early.
- Agentic approach: map each phase to a different agent with strengths; you’re not chasing one “universal AI,” you’re orchestrating a stack.
How Parker glues the stack together
- Pre-work with a PRD pitch: define the problem space, the why, and the high-level solution before touching code.
- Agent roles alignment: analysis, design, construction, testing, deployment are distributed across tools; one tool doesn’t do it all.
- Avoid one-size-fits-all: keep Taskmaster for PM duties and Memory Bank for the architecture, while Cursor/Windsurf handle execution.
- Interface integration: currently separate, with gaps; potential glue via prompts or CLI wrappers to simplify cross-tool workflows.
Practical takeaways you can apply
- Do the pre-work up-front: outline the Why and the core problem before prompting AI.
- Use Shape Up as your north star: start with a PRD, sketch the solution, time-box, and document risks (rabbit holes, no-gos).
- Map prompts to the PRD: structure prompts so they advance the plan rather than just generate outputs.
- Treat tooling as a stack, not a single fix: assign roles to components (PM, architect, executor) and optimize their handoffs.
- Start small with live builds: Parker plans 20-minute live build episodes to show glue-work in real life.
- Keep the iteration cadence practical: don’t chase a perfect stack; get several working integrations and improve them incrementally.
- Want the prompt template? Comment “prompt” below; there’s a keyboard shortcut (F1) to pull pre-work prompts.
Ongoing experiments and content plan
- Weekly live builds: 20-minute episodes showing real-world uses of the stack.
- Three-part-per-week live build series planned on the main channel; daily channel will feature updates and quick insights.
- Focus areas: how to glue Taskmaster, Klein, and Cursor/Windsurf into a coherent workflow for a real project.
Upcoming and current projects
- School offering: half off now, rising to full price after launch.
- ivibewithi.com: Parker’s rolled-into AI-powered school/community project.
Links
- Shape Up by Basecamp (book)
- Google Design Sprint (5-day framework)
- Y Combinator (concepts on rapid product validation)
- I Vibe With AI (AI-powered school project)
- Parker Rex Main Channel (for live builds and deeper dives)