Developers who are told to use AI whether they like it or not, however, tell a different story.
Well there’s the problem.
I’m a software developer and I say that AI is the greatest force-multiplier that’s been introduced into the field since the compiler. I love using it, it handles the most tedious and annoying parts of the process. But there are situations I don’t want to use it in, and of course being forced to use would give me a more negative opinion of it. Obviously.
In the late 1980s there was a time where we seriously weighed the option of hand assembly vs using compilers and hand assembly didn’t always lose. In the early 1990s I wanted to use C++ but the available compiler for IBM compatible PCs was too buggy to be of value.
By the mid 1990s that had changed, good C compilers were exceeding all but the highest effort human assembly code - if you didn’t like how it looked in assembly, you could much more easily “fix it” with a tweak to the C code instead of the assembly. I feel like we’re sort of getting there with AI agent LLMs today - if you don’t like what it provided, tell it why and let it try again - it’s usually faster and easier and gets a better product for the time invested to use the tool instead of calling it a slop box and doing it yourself.
I’m a software developer and I say that AI is the greatest force-multiplier that’s been introduced into the field since the compiler.
As a person who works with coworkers who fully embraced it, it doesn’t look like they are any faster. There is one group that is faster, but they don’t verify their code and provide burden of it on another person who reviews PR to go through their shit code (sorry, but it is unnecessarily complex, does things in weird ways, I’ve seen it had bugs that even canceled each other (I guess this is probably due to re-running until things work))
I think it is domain of young developers who just want choice to do what they do, but don’t care how.
Even you use LLM you often have similar mindset.
I belong to group of people with a weakness that I want to understand every step of the code that I produce. When LLM produces something I need to understand what it does (which takes time) then I realize I could do it better way, so I rewrite it. So LLM just slows me down.
I understand many things clearly, but when it comes to binary yes/no true/false 1/0 type results my brain tends to answer: Yes, it’s one of those. I don’t think I’ve made a double inversion “working” error since the 1990s, but I know I’ve seen others do it - even in Rust.
There isn’t any credible evidence out there that actually shows LLMs are a “force multiplier.” That is almost certainly just a made up marketing term for unprofitable chatbot companies.
Well there’s the problem.
I’m a software developer and I say that AI is the greatest force-multiplier that’s been introduced into the field since the compiler. I love using it, it handles the most tedious and annoying parts of the process. But there are situations I don’t want to use it in, and of course being forced to use would give me a more negative opinion of it. Obviously.
In the late 1980s there was a time where we seriously weighed the option of hand assembly vs using compilers and hand assembly didn’t always lose. In the early 1990s I wanted to use C++ but the available compiler for IBM compatible PCs was too buggy to be of value.
By the mid 1990s that had changed, good C compilers were exceeding all but the highest effort human assembly code - if you didn’t like how it looked in assembly, you could much more easily “fix it” with a tweak to the C code instead of the assembly. I feel like we’re sort of getting there with AI agent LLMs today - if you don’t like what it provided, tell it why and let it try again - it’s usually faster and easier and gets a better product for the time invested to use the tool instead of calling it a slop box and doing it yourself.
As a person who works with coworkers who fully embraced it, it doesn’t look like they are any faster. There is one group that is faster, but they don’t verify their code and provide burden of it on another person who reviews PR to go through their shit code (sorry, but it is unnecessarily complex, does things in weird ways, I’ve seen it had bugs that even canceled each other (I guess this is probably due to re-running until things work))
I’ve seen human coders do this quite a bit, even myself - always unintentional, usually brain-bending when you find the first inversion.
I think it is domain of young developers who just want choice to do what they do, but don’t care how.
Even you use LLM you often have similar mindset.
I belong to group of people with a weakness that I want to understand every step of the code that I produce. When LLM produces something I need to understand what it does (which takes time) then I realize I could do it better way, so I rewrite it. So LLM just slows me down.
I understand many things clearly, but when it comes to binary yes/no true/false 1/0 type results my brain tends to answer: Yes, it’s one of those. I don’t think I’ve made a double inversion “working” error since the 1990s, but I know I’ve seen others do it - even in Rust.
people shit down your throat and you celebrate and beg for more. Absolute clownshow.
There isn’t any credible evidence out there that actually shows LLMs are a “force multiplier.” That is almost certainly just a made up marketing term for unprofitable chatbot companies.
‘Your personal experience is invalid because it goes against the circlejerk’
Did you miss the part about no credible evidence? Feeling like something is a certain way doesn’t make it true.
If it’s a tool you can use yourself and it makes you more efficient, you don’t need a study to recognize its efficiency.
If you’re a software engineer, just try it yourself. Your own experience is the best proof you can find to judge if a tool is useful to you or not.