Anna McPhee
HI! I’m a code wrangler and connection-seeker from New Zealand.
After many nomadic years across 42 countries, I’m now settled in regional Victoria, Australia with my partner and daughter.
What started as a one-way ticket to Bangkok in 2014 became an 8-year journey of building things with code, words, and communities; from Buddhist sanctuaries in Malaysia to refugee camps in Greece, from permaculture projects in Portugal to Amazonian treehouses in Colombia.
These days I write about the places where technology meets creativity meets humanity: making the web more accessible, finding patterns in unexpected places, and building systems that work for neurodiverse brains like mine.
After years of professional development work, I’ve learned that the best code, like the best travel stories, connects people to something larger than themselves.
When I’m not wrangling code, or chasing my daughter around the garden, I write about creative systems, personal growth, deep thinking, and the art of making things grow, whether that’s code, flowers, or communities.
My approach to both life and technology is decidedly nonlinear, which turns out to be exactly what makes both interesting.
-
AI & WordPress at Enqueue
AI without context gives you mystery replacement boyfriends. With Model Context Protocol, WordPress can finally tell AI what it actually can do… no more guessing based on vibes.
Written by
-
Bridging Vibe Coding to Production with MCP
I asked AI to remove my boyfriend from a photo – it gave me a different man and a jungle background. At Web Directions Dev Summit, I used this to show why AI needs context. Without it, you get statistical averages instead of solutions.
Written by
-
A mostly-metaphoric MCP glossary
Learning MCP shouldn’t require choosing between ‘What does MCP stand for?’ and dense protocol documentation.
Written by
-
Three AI customisation concepts
Understanding complex AI concepts through some (hopefully) relatable metaphors.
Written by
-
AI Replaced My Boyfriend: A Story About Context in Machine Learning
I attempted to get a professional headshot, but ended up with AI matchmaking.
Written by
-
Are we underestimating junior developers?
I keep seeing posts defending junior devs as “future seniors,” but this misses the point. If we’re only hiring juniors to write code that AI can generate, we’re not treating them right.
Written by
-
A short memory from la Amazonía
I sat swaddled in mosquito nets, glugging sparkling wine out of the bottle while listening to the roaring furore of howler monkeys in the distance.
Written by
-
I Am an Engineer
I was my own worst gatekeeper until I realised that engineering isn’t about credentials, it’s about how I approach building software.
Written by
-
Cocina Oaxaqueña
When I look at these photographs I collected across more than a decade in Oaxaca, the textures and colours transport me immediately – I can taste the flavours all over again.
Written by
