A template repository for building your first real software project — from vision through working prototype.
Part of Vildly Academy.
Click Use this template → Create a new repository to get your own copy with the docs/ structure ready to fill in.
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├── README.md ← this file (replace with your project description)
└── docs/
├── README.md ← table of contents
├── project-vision.md ← what you're building and why
├── project-plan.md ← scope, milestones, risks
├── requirements.md ← what the system must do
├── architecture.md ← how the system is structured
├── design.md ← personas, wireframes, user flows
└── post-mortem.md ← end-of-project reflection
apprentice-architect is the planning and architecture half of building software. It walks you through:
- writing a one-page project vision
- breaking it down into requirements and user flows
- making sensible architectural choices for a small team
- doing a meaningful post-mortem at the end
The companion course apprentice-millwright picks up where this leaves off and handles deployment, CI/CD, monitoring, and keeping the system running.
Project Vision high-level goals and base requirements
├─ Project Plan milestones, scope, risks
├─ Architecture how the system is structured
└─ Design user personas, wireframes, user flows
└─ Requirements one requirement per user flow (BR-X)
Fill them in roughly in order. You don't need everything upfront, but Vision should exist before you write Design, and Requirements before Architecture stabilises.
These are living documents. Return to them as your understanding of the problem and solution evolves. A requirement you wrote early on may need updating later — that is expected, not a mistake.
Replace this README with a description of your own project once you've created your repo from the template.