Continuing from the first post.

After the planning phase I had a [PROMPTS.md](http://PROMPTS.md) — every prompt for the whole project, split by phase, with the MCPs and skills each one needs, plus a checklist of what to verify before running it. Useful to have before you write a single line of code.

**Initialize Project** — Next.js 14+, Tailwind v4, shadcn/ui. Ran in 9m21s.

Hit a Next.js middleware issue almost immediately. That took longer than it should have. At the first checkpoint I went to verify the GitHub repo and the MCP wasn't responding at all.

Turns out I'd installed it at project scope — which only activates when you're inside that specific folder. I was outside it. Wrote about this in the first post but apparently I hadn't internalized it myself yet. Switched everything to user scope, repushed, continued.

**Install Dependencies** — ran clean. Checkpoint here was `npm run build` to catch errors early. There were errors. I gave Opus 4.6 thinking one instruction: fix the errors, don't touch anything else. It did. Pushed.

**Database Schema** — PostgreSQL + Prisma + Supabase. Tables created. Verified in Prisma Studio — connection good, schema matched.

Next is authentication with NextAuth v5. After that, something I think gets underbuilt in most early-stage projects: a proper email alert system. Not just transactional emails — if a tool fails or something suspicious hits your app, you want to know right away. Worth setting up early.

Hit the usage limit before I got there. Back in a week.

Update: Phase 1 MVP — what actually happened