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In this post I wanted to talk a little bit about the state of ProcessWire and AI. I'll share what my experience has been so far and where I think ProcessWire should focus going forward. This new world of AI can be both exciting and concerning, but it's the world that we've found ourselves in. As far as ProcessWire and web development goes, I think there's a lot to be excited and enthusiastic about— https://processwire.com/blog/posts/processwire-and-ai/

@HMCB it's Claudia, and we're meeting up for coffee next week.

So ProcessWire now has the beginnings of a first-party "schema" (in the ProcessWire sense) migrations system? YES!!!

I’m worried about you, @ryan. You talk about Claude like a person. Pretty soon you’ll be in your basement in your underwear, unshaven for weeks and your family is going to be wondering what happened to the family man they knew. And please don’t accidentally call Claude Claudette because your wife will truly think something is going on with this newfound friend of yours. Hopefully we can rely on one weekly post from you. Just to let us know you’re ok. But even then, how do we know Claude isn’t writing for you. We may have to start doing weekly Zoom updates (yes, with video on!).

From my experience, even asking an LLM (like ChatGPT in their website chat interface) about ProcessWire's architecture is pretty impressive. I spent a lot of time last year using AI to compare (verbally compare, not direct code) ProcessWire to full-stack web application frameworks like Laravel and the language it used to describe ProcessWire, with API variables like $pages, $fields, etc as "services-like objects" was something I've never seen described anywhere (pw docs or forums), but it's technically correct, and a lot of things clicked with me after that. These coding agents do really well with ProcessWire without any special harnesses already. I'm excited for all these upcoming features.

@Jonathan Lahijani very little code in the module to make it happen. You tell the AI what changes you want in your site, and it writes the code for the changes to a file, runs the file (which makes the changes), and then you can copy the file to another installation (or have the agent do it) and re-run it there, making the same changes. It's only as good as the AI agent, but Claude at least seems to be really good with PW's api. The AI agent learns how to create the migration from the included .md files.

This week I worked with Claude Code on refactoring the core WireHooks class to improve it in various ways. I do this work because I like to code, so am of course handling that part. But Claude has been very helpful in finding issues as well as reviewing all my code before it gets committed. In this case, Claude found several bugs that are now fixed, and also saved me from introducing more when I added new features. Working with Claude Code reminds me of 1989 when I was in high school learning Turbo Pascal and building a BBS, and getting help from a neighbor and good friend that was doing the same. I learned so much then and now it feels like that time again. But man have things come a long way since then. I asked Claude about helping with the ProcessWire issues and requests GitHub repos, and now it's solving issue reports, replying to them and committing fixes. For simple fixes that involve a line or two, I'm going to let it handle the the whole thing. It's posting under my GitHub account, but it identifies itself as Claude in replies and and in commits. That way it's easy to tell what it does under my account. I had it just cover a couple of issue reports today as a test (see 2195 and 2192), but will be having it do a lot more going forward. Back to the WireHooks class, I asked Claude about writing a commit message for the WireHooks updates, and wow, check this out: Bug fixes in WireHooks: - conditionalArgMatch(): Fix Selector mutation bug where the shared Selector object stored in hook options was permanently mutated after the first call, causing argMatch hooks (e.g. addHook('WireLog::save(=errors)')) to stop matching after their first invocation. - getHooks(): Remove key variable from foreach to prevent shadowing $method param. - getHooks(): Replace array_merge() in loops with direct array append. - addHook(): Prevent 'noAddHooks' option from leaking into stored hook options. - isHookedOrParents(): Use $className string consistently in cache key writes, rather than $class which may be a Wire object. - runHooks(): Scope $useHookReturnValue inside foreach so it resets per hook. - runHooks(): Use strict null comparison ($toObject === null). Bug fixes in HookEvent: - arguments(): Allow setting an argument value to null (use func_num_args() > 1 instead of $value !== null check). - arguments(): Use array_key_exists() instead of isset() for null-correct lookup. - getArgumentNames(): Guard ReflectionMethod instantiation with method_exists() to avoid uncaught ReflectionException for dynamically-added hook methods. - __toString(): Fix argument list building (was appending to string instead of array), add null/bool display, avoid PHP fatal for objects without __toString(). New features in WireHooks: - cancelHooks: Now accepts string values 'before' or 'after' (in addition to boolean true) to cancel only hooks of a given type. For example, a before hook can set $event->cancelHooks = 'after' to cancel remaining after hooks without affecting the hooked method call. - Custom event data carry-forward: Custom data set on a HookEvent (via $event->customKey = $value) is now carried forward to subsequent HookEvent instances within the same runHooks() call. This allows before hooks to pass data to after hooks without using external variables. - getHooks('*'): Supports wildcard method to return all hooks for all objects. Available in debug mode only (uses allStaticHooks/allLocalHooks aggregates). - allStaticHooks: Now tracked alongside allLocalHooks when debug mode is on. - addHooks() comment fix: "If there is a parenthesis" corrected to "no parenthesis". - addHook() exception messages improved with additional context. - runHooks() docblock updated to include 'either' type. - hookTimer() PHPDoc: @param String corrected to lowercase string. New features in HookEvent: - $defaults static property: Defines the canonical set of standard HookEvent fields, used to distinguish custom data from built-in event properties. - $eid property: Each HookEvent instance gets a unique sequential event ID. - set() override: Tracks non-default keys set on the event in $customKeys. - getCustomData(): Returns only the custom (non-default) data set on the event, used internally by runHooks() for the carry-forward feature. - cancelHooks property updated to support bool|string type. Anyway, I know a lot of you here are deep into the AI stuff, and I'm just getting started, so none of this is surprising. But it sure is a pleasure collaborating with Claude Code on this stuff and it brings back that coding wonder and excitement from 1989. Some Claude and Claude Code podcasts I've enjoyed listening to or watching this week include one from AI for Humans Claude is Cooking, Wednesday's AI Daily Brief on How to use Claude's new upgrades, and the Get Educated AI video of how to setup Claude to use your computer and web browser, etc. (though I've not tried this just yet!). Lastly, last week I put together a ProcessWire powered JSON feed of bike tours, and the client prompted that they wanted a map and look what Claude Code did, I'm impressed!

Thanks, great suggestions. Being still kind of new to this, I've found myself overwhelmed by all agents tools and options. So having Claude code as the base is what I feel helped me to finally get into this stuff. It's like my key into this world. And I think it's working so well right now that I'm not concerned about whether a file is named Claude or agents, but it's good to know about for sure. If we start adding this type of file to the core then no doubt we'd want it to be an agents file, so that a broader audience can benefit from it. At the moment I'm loving the commit messages, claude attributions and GitHub replies. Feels like I have a coworker working with me at my computer all day now, which is something I've never had. but if it gets to be too much it's definitely helpful to know that this stuff is configurable. New PW AI updates coming tomorrow too.

I'm happy to see you found your workflow using Claude Code. 🙂 A few things I'd suggest to make it a bit more future-proof and less focussed on one tool (Claude/Claude Code). I'm not sure if you use a CLAUDE.md file yet but in case you do or when you start using it, do this: In CLAUDE.md just add: @AGENTS.md And then write your instructions in/to AGENTS.md. The reason is simple: CLAUDE.md just works for Claude, but AGENTS.md works for almost any other AI agent. This way, either in a CLAUDE.md or AGENTS.md, you can customize comments in issues, like: ## GitHub issue and PR comments When responding in GitHub issue or PR comments: - Be concise, direct, and helpful. - Start with the answer first. - Use short paragraphs or bullets when useful. - Avoid unnecessary disclaimers, hedging, or repetition. - If the user asks for a change, give the exact action or code needed. - If more context is needed, ask one clear follow-up question. - Keep the tone professional, friendly, and technical. - Do not write long explanations unless explicitly requested. - Always add this as the last line in comments: [🤖 Answered by Joshi - Ryan's custom AI Agent.] Another thing you could change is updating the Claude settings.json to disable or customize the attribution line in commits and pull requests. https://code.claude.com/docs/en/settings https://code.claude.com/docs/en/settings#attribution-settings