Vibe coding is good enough for personal prototypes, but to build and deploy anything in production you need a few core engineering skills: - Decomposition: break big problems into smaller pieces - Iteration: start simple, improve step by step - Design for change: write code that is easy to adapt when requirements change (they always do!) - Simplicity first: avoid over-complicating solutions (AI often makes this mistake) - Testing: check your code against both normal and edge cases - Debugging: track down why actual behavior differs from what you expected - Optimization: make programs fast and efficient - Version control: manage changes and collaborate safely - Error handling: recover gracefully instead of crashing - Code reuse: build on existing solutions instead of reinventing - User experience design: make apps feel natural - Client–server architecture: understand how to split work between the frontend and the backend AI coding agents can help with many of these, but you still need to know what to ask for and when to reject their default suggestions.