After spending about 3 hours making a app in Firebase, I left for about 2 hours, and came back, after having to refresh and reload the project, I went back to finish the code up, so I could test if it actually made a full app, it started rewriting all the code and set me back hours, and changed the context of the app itself.
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Hi @Bob_Jones - sorry to hear that this happened. Can you share more details. Were you using our App Prototyping capability to build an app when this happened?
Well I just made a new empty workspace, and asked it to make a Python/Flask MMO street type game, It did this pretty good, once it got going. So I had to do real world stuff, and came back, got forced to refresh and reload the project. Then when we did a status check it went from 100% of the code code done to 20%, after asking it to review the code base, it said it was about 79%, so I figured hey let’s see what happens, and it start making new code for things already built, change the theme to a Medieval theme, and did not use any of our json files we had setup to easily expand without needing to edit the code base. So I spent another two hours trying to get it back in line, and well it seems to have split the code into two different paths. So I will just try it again, and now I know this might have it to keep up with a project.json file to ensure we keep session data saved somewhere that the AI can easily read and catch up on.
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Yeah… what happened there makes sense, even though it’s frustrating.
When you refreshed, the session context was partially lost. The AI doesn’t truly “remember” your full codebase unless it’s still inside the active context window. So when you asked for a status check, it was estimating based only on what it could still see — not your full original project. That’s why it dropped from 100% → 20% → 79% and then started rebuilding features that already existed.
The theme switch to Medieval and ignoring your JSON structure happened because, without full context, it defaulted to a new interpretation of the project instead of continuing your original architecture.
You’re absolutely thinking in the right direction with a project.json (or similar spec file). A structured “source of truth” helps a lot. Even better would be:
-
A
project_overview.mdexplaining architecture, theme, and design rules -
A clear folder structure summary
-
A “DO NOT CHANGE” section (theme, data system, JSON usage, etc.)
-
A progress tracker listing completed systems
Then whenever you return, you can paste that file and say:
“Review this and continue strictly within these constraints.”
That prevents drift, duplicate systems, and theme changes.
Also, instead of asking “review the codebase,” it’s better to say:
“Based only on the files I provide below, what is complete and what is missing? Do not redesign anything.”
AI is powerful for building, but it doesn’t maintain persistent project state unless you deliberately give it one.
You learned the right lesson from this — next attempt will go much smoother.
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