We gave an AI Coding Assistant a design file.
Here is what happened.
AI is changing everything - including how we build software. Coding assistants are everywhere, and the hype is real. But so are the concerns:
- Will it scale?
- Can I trust the output?
- What happens when things go wrong?
We get it. We are a software company ourselves and like everyone else: we are under pressure to deliver more, faster and smarter.
So we asked us a simple question: what if we could make AI coding assistants "safe by design"?
knowis workbench meets coding assistant
In our product, architecture and design are not an afterthoughts. They are executable assets packaged as living design files that define: what gets built, how it works and why it matters.
From ideation to architecture to design specs, we align early and keep everything versioned and in sync with Git repo, pipelines and stacks.
So we took a mainstream coding assistant to run a hackathon. We didn’t write user stories. We didn’t hand over vague requirements. Instead, we fed the coding assistant the structured design artifacts generated from the knowis Workbench. Simple.
The Result? It worked well:
- Code generation was fast, focused, and aligned with our intent.
- Architecture guardrails stayed intact, even with rapid iterations.
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Review and testing? Easier than ever.
"Shift left" matters
Shifting the (investment) focus to the "left" of the software development process doesn’t just mean testing earlier. It means thinking, designing earlier. Better. Because AI accelerates code but architecture and design defines what gets built.
Conclusion and Recommendation
In a few words: you don’t need to fear coding assistants. You need to feed them better inputs. Learn more about knowis Cloud Solution Workbench and our vision of software development acceleration.
