My AI over-engineered everything. So I gave it a ponytail.

说明与用途

Ponytail 是一种工作流程，通过决策阶梯和注释来限制 AI 生成代码的过度抽象，便于后续升级。

问题

AI coding agents tend to over-engineer solutions, adding unnecessary abstractions that increase maintenance burden.

结果

Ponytail reduced code complexity, avoided unnecessary abstractions, and introduced clear upgrade paths, improving maintainability and deployment speed.

工作流

• Ask AI for a feature
• Apply ponytail ladder: 1) Does it need to exist? 2) Is it already in the codebase? 3) Does the standard library cover it? 4) Does a native platform feature cover it? 5) Is an existing dependency sufficient? 6) Can it be one line? 7) If none, write minimal code
• If a shortcut is taken, add a "ponytail:" comment noting the ceiling and upgrade path
• Harvest all ponytail comments for later review

证据

Ask an AI coding agent for a cache and you'll get a cache class. With a TTL. And an eviction policy. And an interface for the cache, in case you ever want a second cache. And a factory for the interface.

来源

Ponytail is a list of questions, asked in order. The agent stops at the first rung that works: ...

来源

The ponytail answer was a 20-line launcher that starts the API and the worker as two processes in one container, and exits the container if either dies so the host restarts it.

来源

Ponytail shipped the image running TypeScript directly, with a comment naming the ceiling and the exact upgrade path.

来源