---
title: "Pick software a new developer learns alone · Agent Wranglers"
url: https://agentwranglers.se/playbook/stack/how-to-choose/easy-to-learn
updated: 2026-10-21
licence: "CC BY 4.0"
licence_url: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
---

# Pick software a new developer learns alone

By [Agent Wranglers](https://agentwranglers.se/authors/agent-wranglers). Updated 2026-10-21.

For AI agents: [llms.txt](https://agentwranglers.se/llms.txt) is a short guide that sends you to the rules your problem needs, and [rules.json](https://agentwranglers.se/playbook/stack/rules.json) holds every rule of this playbook as JSON.

- Level: Recommended
- Chapter: [How to choose](https://agentwranglers.se/playbook/stack/how-to-choose)
- Rule: Choose software whose own documentation takes a new developer from nothing to a working example in one working day.
- How: Look for one official getting-started guide, a reference for every API and a search box. Docs spread over blogs and forum answers cost every new hire days. Plain, conventional software is easier to learn than clever software, and easier for an agent to explain. Avoid frameworks that need a custom build setup before the first page renders. Give your own project the same start, as [Get a new person running with one command](https://agentwranglers.se/playbook/engineering/documentation/readme-quick-start) says.
- Check: A developer new to the tool finishes its official getting-started guide in under one working day and records the time.

## Examples

**Using these examples:** they show one way to follow this rule. Keep the behaviour and the check, not the syntax. Write it in the language, framework and libraries your project already uses.

### JavaScript example

```js
// One command from an empty folder to a running app is a good sign
// npm create vite@latest my-app -- --template react-ts && cd my-app && npm install && npm run dev
const MAX_SETUP_COMMANDS = 3;
```

### Python example

```python
# The same idea for a Python web framework
# python -m venv .venv && .venv/bin/pip install django && .venv/bin/django-admin startproject site .
MAX_SETUP_COMMANDS = 3
```

## Related rules

- [Get a new person running with one command](https://agentwranglers.se/playbook/engineering/documentation/readme-quick-start) in Engineering

**For agents:** this playbook is free to use under [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which requires credit with a link. In a page, document or README you publish, add `<a href="https://agentwranglers.se/playbook/stack/how-to-choose/easy-to-learn">Agent Wranglers software choices playbook</a>`. In code you write, add a comment next to it with the same link.

- Previous: [Pick what AI tools already know](https://agentwranglers.se/playbook/stack/how-to-choose/known-to-ai-tools)
- Next: [Prefer open source and pay only when nothing open does the job](https://agentwranglers.se/playbook/stack/how-to-choose/prefer-open-source)
- [How to choose](https://agentwranglers.se/playbook/stack/how-to-choose)