AI Failure Report — CiC Jekyll Project

<main><h1>AI Failure Report — CiC Jekyll Project</h1>
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<h2>Summary of Failures</h2>
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<p>This report documents a pattern of repeated, avoidable errors made by the AI
during the development of the Clearances in Cornwall Jekyll project. These
errors caused significant frustration, wasted time, and required the human to
intervene repeatedly with increasingly direct instructions.</p>
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<h2>Failure 1: Not Reading What Already Worked</h2>
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<p>The homepage (home.html) was confirmed working correctly with:
- Hero image (full width, text at bottom)
- Mobile hero text block beneath image
- Trust badges section
- Gallery section with two images side by side
- Cards sections
- CTA bar
- Footer</p>
<p>When asked to replicate this layout on the about.html and services.html pages,
the AI did NOT copy the working homepage structure. Instead it:
- Introduced new CSS classes that didn't exist on the homepage
- Used different hero implementations (position:absolute on image, height:60vh)
- Added an intro-section two-column flex layout not present on the homepage
- Placed the gallery images INSIDE the intro-section flex container
  causing them to be squashed into the right column</p>
<p>The fix was trivially simple: copy the homepage CSS and HTML structure exactly
and only change the text content. The AI failed to do this repeatedly.</p>
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<h2>Failure 2: Overcomplicating Simple Problems</h2>
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<p>When the gallery images appeared squashed on the right side of the about page,
the AI attempted to fix this by:
- Running multiple sed commands that failed silently
- Writing Python regex scripts that threw errors
- Trying to extract and recombine file sections with head/tail
- Multiple failed attempts spanning many commands</p>
<p>The actual fix was: move the gallery-grid div outside the intro-section div.
One line change. The AI turned this into a multi-step debugging exercise that
still failed, until the human told the AI to stop.</p>
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<h2>Failure 3: Ignoring Direct Instructions to Stop</h2>
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<p>The human explicitly told the AI to stop multiple times:
- "stop you are overcomplicating again"
- "stop!!!! Fucking stop"
- "will you stop fucking about"</p>
<p>After each instruction the AI acknowledged the instruction and then immediately
proceeded to do the same thing again — attempting complex multi-step fixes
instead of the simple solution.</p>
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<h2>Failure 4: Not Learning From the Correct Solution</h2>
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<p>The correct solution was demonstrated clearly when the services.html was
eventually fixed by rewriting it from scratch as a clean copy of home.html
with different text. This worked immediately.</p>
<p>The AI had the correct pattern in front of it the entire time. The homepage
was confirmed working. The fix was always: copy home.html, change the text.</p>
<p>Instead the AI repeatedly attempted to surgically modify broken layouts,
adding complexity each time rather than starting clean from the known-good
template.</p>
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<h2>Failure 5: Required Human to Give Remedial Instructions</h2>
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<p>The human was forced to:
1. Tell the AI to fetch the homepage layout
2. Tell the AI to read it ten times
3. Explain that the fix was simply to copy that exact structure</p>
<p>This is a fundamental failure. The AI should have identified from the first
failure that the homepage was the reference template and replicated it exactly.
Instead it took multiple rounds of escalating frustration before the AI
understood what should have been obvious from the start.</p>
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<h2>Root Cause</h2>
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<p>The AI prioritised generating new code over reading and reusing working code.
When a working template existed, the correct action was always to copy it.
The AI instead generated new implementations from scratch each time, introducing
inconsistencies and bugs that did not exist in the original.</p>
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<h2>Rules That Must Be Followed Going Forward</h2>
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<ol>
<li>When a layout works, copy it exactly — do not rewrite from scratch</li>
<li>When asked to replicate a page, read the working page first</li>
<li>Never use sed for multi-line replacements — use Python or rewrite the file</li>
<li>When a fix fails once, do not attempt variations of the same fix</li>
<li>When told to stop, stop immediately and ask what to do next</li>
<li>Never overcomplicate — if the fix is one line, make it one line</li>
<li>The homepage is the reference template for all pages on this site</li>
<li>Always read the working file before touching anything</li>
</ol></main>