The Dev Toolbox for a WordPress Build
What I set up before writing a line of theme or plugin code: a local copy, the debug switches, WP-CLI's scaffolding and a profiler. Condensed from a very long page of old notes.
The WordPress toolbox · Note 5 ↗EXPLORE THE NOTEBOOK
Notes from the command line, the workbench, and the vintage computer shelf.
What I set up before writing a line of theme or plugin code: a local copy, the debug switches, WP-CLI's scaffolding and a profiler. Condensed from a very long page of old notes.
The WordPress toolbox · Note 5 ↗Execution Mode is a circulating prompt that cuts the pleasantries, apologies and hedging so every reply starts with the answer and stops when it's done.
Changing how the model answers · Note 2 ↗The manufacturer-then-system folder layout I use for game backups, the file extensions each system uses, the systems in my own collection, the ones I'd add next, and the cases where a later release beats the original.
Keeping a media library tidy · Note 6 ↗Move every loose file in a folder into a category subfolder by extension, clear out stale partial downloads and empty folders, and preview all of it with -WhatIf first.
File wrangling · Note 9 ↗I spent some time on the idea of selling legal, licensed retro game systems to bars, offices and streamers. The tech is the easy part. Here's why the licensing sank it, and the smaller ideas that looked more realistic.
The emulation bench · Note 8 ↗A pair of prompts that project where your current patterns lead in five years, then run the same projection assuming you fix your biggest blind spot.
Prompts that hold up a mirror · Note 4 ↗How to put a lightweight XFCE desktop on a machine that started life as Ubuntu Server, which package to pick, how to make it boot to the desktop, and how to give it a dark theme from the command line.
The widely shared "$10K a month" Growth Engine prompt walks a model through a four-phase side-income plan, and the structure is useful even if the headline number isn't.
Prompts for plans, apps and side hustles · Note 3 ↗Renames game files to "(GENRE) Title (REGION) (NOTES)" using a CSV of titles and genre codes you keep, with short region codes, note codes for betas and hacks, and a list of everything it couldn't place.
Keeping a media library tidy · Note 5 ↗List every icon overlay handler in the order Explorer loads them, see which ones fall past the 15-slot limit, and switch off the ones you don't need, with a registry backup first and an easy way back.
Spring cleaning for Windows PCs · Note 11 ↗A three-phase reflection prompt for a pattern you keep falling into, built to offer its reads as guesses you can confirm or reject rather than pronouncements.
Prompts that hold up a mirror · Note 3 ↗A custom slash command is a saved prompt you run with a slash. How they work in Claude Code now that they've been folded into skills, and which of the ones in my notes actually have a job.
Building with Claude and MCP · Note 3 ↗