Useful hint for vibe-coding: if you’re building something mostly for yourself but that should work cross-device, you don’t need to deploy it to the internet, but can have a server running locally that’s exposed to your wifi, which allows multiple devices to easily talk to each other, allows easy file persistence and so on. Comes with much less friction than having to set up some account/backend/database somewhere and likely has lower security risk (but certainly not 0, as people may be able to connect to your wifi without you knowing). (Edit: one more advantage is that a coding agent can end-to-end test what it builds more easily this way)
Some examples of what I’ve used this for:
using my phone as a remote control for my PC, letting my phone act as a touchpad + keyboard so that I can control my desktop PC (which is connected to my TV screen) from the couch without having to buy extra hardware like a Bluetooth keyboard. There’s a tiny app on the PC that opens a terminal where it displays a QR code which exposes a locally hosted web app for the PC controls. So I have to scan that once initially, and then my phone is connected. Any phone (that’s in my flat and in my wifi) can scan this QR code and then control the PC through its mobile browser[1].
for a recent party, I vibe-coded a side quests app. Every guest who was in the wifi could follow a simple link to open the web app in their browser. They insert their name, which is used as a seed for a personalized side quest selection. (at previous parties I just used Claude’s integrated web app hosting for that, which worked just as well and doesn’t require people connecting to your wifi; but then this app gets public, which you may see as a disadvantage, e.g. in case some side quests reveal personal information about people)
for the same party, I vibe-coded a “photo station” app. I had my laptop set up in a well-lit corner of the party, with a web app that accesses the webcam and has ~20 different modes of doing fun things to the webcam contents, e.g. replacing the background with nice pictures / fractals / memes, or surrounding people with animated shoggoth-esque tentacles, or just blurring the background for portrait shots, or many other things, including some fun interactive modes where people can play around and create cool images featuring themselves. This app also hosts a gallery of all photos taken during the evening (which are stored on the laptop’s hard drive). The gallery, when displayed on the laptop, contains a QR code which people can scan to see the entire gallery on their phone (as long as they’re connected to my wifi) where they can then download these images.
Just knowing that this is possible unlocked a lot of cool options that, if I had to rely on hosting things on the internet, I likely would have dismissed due to friction/risk/implications being beyond what I’d find acceptable for building any given thing.
But of course, be careful with this. Ensure your wifi is well-secured and that you trust the people you give access to it.
Out of caution, I ensured to only let one device connect at a time (meaing when I connect my phone, I can be sure nobody else is able to connect even if they find the QR code), and the server shuts itself down after some time of receiving no input, so I can’t accidentally leave it running and forget about it. There are some more security features baked in, but probably not worth getting into these here. Plus, if any individual was sufficiently motivated to attack me, they’d likely find easier ways than through this app anyway. I basically ruled out accidental as well as spontaneous misuse of it, which seems sufficient.
Big fan of this! I recently vibecoded a racing game where everyone’s phones are tilt-sensitive steering wheels. Also it’s possible to create QR codes for wifi, which reduces connection to just scanning two QR codes in a row.
Useful hint for vibe-coding: if you’re building something mostly for yourself but that should work cross-device, you don’t need to deploy it to the internet, but can have a server running locally that’s exposed to your wifi, which allows multiple devices to easily talk to each other, allows easy file persistence and so on. Comes with much less friction than having to set up some account/backend/database somewhere and likely has lower security risk (but certainly not 0, as people may be able to connect to your wifi without you knowing). (Edit: one more advantage is that a coding agent can end-to-end test what it builds more easily this way)
Some examples of what I’ve used this for:
using my phone as a remote control for my PC, letting my phone act as a touchpad + keyboard so that I can control my desktop PC (which is connected to my TV screen) from the couch without having to buy extra hardware like a Bluetooth keyboard. There’s a tiny app on the PC that opens a terminal where it displays a QR code which exposes a locally hosted web app for the PC controls. So I have to scan that once initially, and then my phone is connected. Any phone (that’s in my flat and in my wifi) can scan this QR code and then control the PC through its mobile browser[1].
for a recent party, I vibe-coded a side quests app. Every guest who was in the wifi could follow a simple link to open the web app in their browser. They insert their name, which is used as a seed for a personalized side quest selection. (at previous parties I just used Claude’s integrated web app hosting for that, which worked just as well and doesn’t require people connecting to your wifi; but then this app gets public, which you may see as a disadvantage, e.g. in case some side quests reveal personal information about people)
for the same party, I vibe-coded a “photo station” app. I had my laptop set up in a well-lit corner of the party, with a web app that accesses the webcam and has ~20 different modes of doing fun things to the webcam contents, e.g. replacing the background with nice pictures / fractals / memes, or surrounding people with animated shoggoth-esque tentacles, or just blurring the background for portrait shots, or many other things, including some fun interactive modes where people can play around and create cool images featuring themselves. This app also hosts a gallery of all photos taken during the evening (which are stored on the laptop’s hard drive). The gallery, when displayed on the laptop, contains a QR code which people can scan to see the entire gallery on their phone (as long as they’re connected to my wifi) where they can then download these images.
Just knowing that this is possible unlocked a lot of cool options that, if I had to rely on hosting things on the internet, I likely would have dismissed due to friction/risk/implications being beyond what I’d find acceptable for building any given thing.
But of course, be careful with this. Ensure your wifi is well-secured and that you trust the people you give access to it.
Out of caution, I ensured to only let one device connect at a time (meaing when I connect my phone, I can be sure nobody else is able to connect even if they find the QR code), and the server shuts itself down after some time of receiving no input, so I can’t accidentally leave it running and forget about it. There are some more security features baked in, but probably not worth getting into these here. Plus, if any individual was sufficiently motivated to attack me, they’d likely find easier ways than through this app anyway. I basically ruled out accidental as well as spontaneous misuse of it, which seems sufficient.
Big fan of this! I recently vibecoded a racing game where everyone’s phones are tilt-sensitive steering wheels. Also it’s possible to create QR codes for wifi, which reduces connection to just scanning two QR codes in a row.