Janne Lammi Posted on May 30 • Originally published at pathmode.io The Intent Layer # ai # programming # productmanagement # productivity The software stack has a gap. On one end: tools that capture signal. Dovetail, Intercom, user research platforms—everything that tells you what users need . On the other end: tools that execute. Cursor, v0, Claude Code—everything that turns instructions into working software. The middle is compressing. And that middle is where the most important work happens: deciding what gets built and why . Most teams skip it. They go straight from customer feedback to a prompt in Cursor. The result: code that solves the wrong problem, or solves it without context. We call this missing middle the Intent Layer . ┌─────────────────────────────────────┐ │ User Signal │ ← Feedback, friction, research ├─────────────────────────────────────┤ │ ▶ Intent Layer ◀ │ ← What gets built & why ├─────────────────────────────────────┤ │ Agentic Execution │ ← Cursor, v0, Claude Code ├─────────────────────────────────────┤ │ Shipped Software │ └─────────────────────────────────────┘ Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode Prompts Are Not Intent A prompt is a request. Intent is a specification. Prompt Intent Spec "Add a checkout flow" Preconditions, expected outcomes, edge cases, traceability to user friction Ephemeral—typed once, discarded Versioned, auditable, persistent Invented by the developer Derived from user signal Optimized for speed to first output Optimized for correctness of final outcome When a developer opens Cursor, they shouldn't be inventing context from scratch. They should be pulling from a system that already computed what needs to be built and why. Prompts generate code. Intent specs generate the right code . Why the Gap Exists Today, intent is scattered across your organization: Research lives in Dovetail. Specs live in Notion or Google Docs. Tasks live in Jira or Linear. Context lives in someone's head. No single system synthesi
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