It created a mess of extra files

Say: “Undo the extra pages. Keep App Router, Tailwind, shadcn, and one homepage.” Git is the undo button.

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First project with Codex

Updated Sep 18, 2026

Point Codex at your repo, ask for a Next.js + shadcn app, run it locally. Do not deploy yet.

Before you start:Install Codex CLI Create a GitHub repo

Open a terminal in the repo folder from Create a GitHub repo.

Terminal

codex

First prompt, boring and specific:

Copy and paste this

This folder is an empty git repo. Scaffold a Next.js App Router site with TypeScript, Tailwind, and shadcn. One column layout. Homepage heading: "hello from my machine". Add a README that says how to run it. Do not invent extra pages. After you finish, tell me the exact command to run the dev server.

Allow file writes. When it stops, run the command it printed. Usually pnpm dev or npm run dev. Open http://localhost:3000. You should see the heading.

Then:

Terminal

git add .
git commit -m "Scaffold Next.js app with Codex"
git push

If .env shows up in git status, stop and fix gitignore.

Next: deploy to Vercel.

Checklist

Mark done

localhost:3000 shows my heading
git status shows the new files

Saved in this browser. No account. Clearing site data wipes it.

Next: Deploy to Vercel

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