🎨 The Art of the Possible

Experiencing AI-Assisted Creation with Windsurf + Claude Sonnet 4

⏱️ Time: ~60 minutes | 👥 For IT Leaders | 💡 No coding experience required

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🎯 Purpose This guided experience helps IT leaders understand how AI embedded in development tools collapses the friction between idea → execution → outcome. You'll build a working tool without prior coding expertise and see direct applicability to real IT use cases.
1

Access & Tooling

Get your Windsurf license and set up your environment

💡 Why this matters: This exercise uses an enterprise-approved, governed AI capability. The point is not experimentation in a vacuum — it is demonstrating what is possible within guardrails.
2

Create a Workspace

Set up your project folder

✅ You should now see: An empty project, a file tree, and an embedded AI assistant. If you can create a folder, you can do this.
3

Establish Collaboration Context

Set up how the AI will work with you

Paste the following exact text into the AI chat:

You are an expert software engineer and teacher embedded inside my editor. Your role is to help me build practical tools by explaining decisions clearly and doing the heavy lifting when appropriate. Assume I am a technical leader, not a full-time developer. Optimize for speed, clarity, and usefulness over perfection.
💡 Why this matters: AI responds dramatically better when you tell it how to collaborate, not just what to do.
4

Build the First App

Create a working web application

🎯 First: Identify a Problem Before building, think of a simple problem or task you encounter regularly. Examples:
  • Tracking team tasks or to-dos
  • Calculating time zones for distributed teams
  • Managing a simple inventory or checklist
  • Converting data formats (CSV to JSON, etc.)
  • Creating a quick reference tool for common procedures

Step 1: Describe your problem to the AI

In your own words, tell the AI about the problem you want to solve. Be specific about what you need.

Step 2: Then paste this prompt:

Build me a simple, self-contained web application to solve this problem. Requirements: Use only HTML, CSS, and vanilla JavaScript Create all necessary files The app must run by opening index.html in a browser Make it visually clean and easy to use Explain what you are doing as you build When finished, ask me what enhancement I want next.
5

Run & Modify

Test your app and make enhancements

💡 Enhancement Examples:
  • Add validation
  • Improve layout
  • Store data locally
  • Add a summary view

This is typically the "aha" moment. This is not a coding exercise — it is accelerated problem-solving.

6

Role-Based Challenges

Choose a challenge aligned to your role

Choose ONE challenge aligned to your role:

🛠 IT Support / End User Services

Option 1: On-Call Rotation Tool

Build a tool that:

  • Stores team members
  • Rotates on-call responsibility
  • Clearly shows who is on call today
  • Optionally persists state locally
Extend this app to manage an on-call rotation for a support team. Keep it simple and explain your logic.

Option 2: Log Evaluation Tool

Build a tool that:

  • Accepts pasted logs or uploaded files
  • Identifies errors, warnings, and anomalies
  • Summarizes findings clearly
Create a tool that analyzes a log file and highlights potential issues for IT support staff.

🧱 Infrastructure Leaders

Option 1: Capacity & Risk Calculator

Build a tool that:

  • Accepts CPU, memory, and node inputs
  • Models growth assumptions
  • Visually flags risk thresholds

Option 2: Incident Timeline Builder

Build a tool that:

  • Captures timestamps and notes
  • Automatically orders events
  • Produces a clean incident narrative

⚙️ Platform / Middleware Leaders

Option 1: Dependency / Blast Radius Tool

Build a tool that:

  • Lists services and dependencies
  • Shows upstream and downstream impact
  • Answers "what breaks if X fails?"

Option 2: Configuration Validator

Build a tool that:

  • Accepts pasted configuration text
  • Checks for common mistakes
  • Explains findings in plain language
7

Reflection (Required)

Capture insights and learnings

📝 Answer the following questions:

  • What surprised you?
  • What work now feels easier than expected?
  • Where could this reduce friction or delay today?
  • What guardrails would be required for broader adoption?

Reflection is critical. Without it, this feels like a novelty instead of a capability shift.

🎉 Congratulations!

You've completed The Art of the Possible experience.

This exercise is not about replacing expertise. It is about:
Compressing feedback loops • Reducing translation loss • Empowering leaders to prototype • Making ideas tangible quickly

This is the art of the possible — experienced, not explained.