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For what it’s worth, Copilot is not being marketed as anything else than code suggestion software - an alternative to google search, perhaps more of a “I’m feel

For what it’s worth, Copilot is not being marketed as anything else than code suggestion software - an alternative to google search, perhaps more of a “I’m feeling lucky” without having to actually type the search term. Knowing how to succinctly express a problem is half the problem after all.

ALittleLight 5y ago
It's called "Copilot" and the tagline is "Your AI pair programmer." It's obviously being marketed as more than code suggestion software. It's being marketed as an AI pair programmer. I agree that it is basically just code suggestion software, or like a big autocomplete. But it's definitely being marketed as more.
- soco 5y ago
  This sounds almost like Tesla's Autopilot, both in naming and in actual performance.
  - toxik 5y ago
    Ha, I ranted about this two weeks ago. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27724969 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27724969
    - JohnWhigham 5y ago
      This is very true, and much like Tesla getting away with it for years (up until recently), GitHub will get away with this for a while as well. And so will the media decrying shit like "Is this the end of developers?!?"
      - craftinator 5y ago
        > And so will the media decrying shit like "Is this the end of developers?!?" Yeah, CoPilot already replaced my job. I used to be the office copypasta, going around to my coworkers desk all day long to fix their problems by googling them, then pasting in the first snippet to pop up. It didn't matter if the language matched or not, it was more the thought that counted. Now I've had to get a job as a loan rejection stamper at my local bank. It's not nearly as fun or exciting, but at least my effort makes a difference now. A big difference.
  - wlesieutre 5y ago
    Full Self Coding Beta
- nimbius 5y ago
  the biggest concern and reason to pump the brakes on copilot is the unresolved elephant in the room: the growing consensus that it violates FOSS licenses.
ahepp 5y ago
Taken directly from the copilot product page: >Tests without the toil. Tests are the backbone of any robust software engineering project. Import a unit test package, and let GitHub Copilot suggest tests that match your implementation code. Accompanied by a picture of copilot filling out the implementation of a unit test, based on the test's name. The implication seems very clearly that it is more than a google search. According to the ads, it understands your code well enough to write the unit tests for it!
- jasode 5y ago
  > According to the ads, it understands your code well enough to write the unit tests for it! Yes, Github Copilot marketing has overstatements -- but it also has caveats about its limitations and creating errors. In other words, the landing page has a mix of statements ... some hyping up the potential -- and some disclaimers to mention the reality and pitfalls. Excerpt from that same Copilot landing page about it being wrong more often than right: https://copilot.github.com/ https://copilot.github.com/ >How good is GitHub Copilot? >We recently benchmarked against a set of Python functions that have good test coverage in open source repos. We blanked out the function bodies and asked GitHub Copilot to fill them in. The model got this right 43% of the time on the first try, and 57% of the time when allowed 10 attempts. >Does GitHub Copilot write perfect code? >No. GitHub Copilot tries to understand your intent and to generate the best code it can, but the code it suggests may not always work, or even make sense. While we are working hard to make GitHub Copilot better, code suggested by GitHub Copilot should be carefully tested, reviewed, and vetted, like any other code.

ALittleLight 5y ago

It's called "Copilot" and the tagline is "Your AI pair programmer." It's obviously being marketed as more than code suggestion software. It's being marketed as an AI pair programmer. I agree that it is basically just code suggestion software, or like a big autocomplete. But it's definitely being marketed as more.

soco 5y ago
This sounds almost like Tesla's Autopilot, both in naming and in actual performance.
- toxik 5y ago
  Ha, I ranted about this two weeks ago. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27724969 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27724969
  - JohnWhigham 5y ago
    This is very true, and much like Tesla getting away with it for years (up until recently), GitHub will get away with this for a while as well. And so will the media decrying shit like "Is this the end of developers?!?"
    - craftinator 5y ago
      > And so will the media decrying shit like "Is this the end of developers?!?" Yeah, CoPilot already replaced my job. I used to be the office copypasta, going around to my coworkers desk all day long to fix their problems by googling them, then pasting in the first snippet to pop up. It didn't matter if the language matched or not, it was more the thought that counted. Now I've had to get a job as a loan rejection stamper at my local bank. It's not nearly as fun or exciting, but at least my effort makes a difference now. A big difference.
- wlesieutre 5y ago
  Full Self Coding Beta
nimbius 5y ago
the biggest concern and reason to pump the brakes on copilot is the unresolved elephant in the room: the growing consensus that it violates FOSS licenses.

ahepp 5y ago

Taken directly from the copilot product page: >Tests without the toil. Tests are the backbone of any robust software engineering project. Import a unit test package, and let GitHub Copilot suggest tests that match your implementation code. Accompanied by a picture of copilot filling out the implementation of a unit test, based on the test's name. The implication seems very clearly that it is more than a google search. According to the ads, it understands your code well enough to write the unit tests for it!

jasode 5y ago
> According to the ads, it understands your code well enough to write the unit tests for it! Yes, Github Copilot marketing has overstatements -- but it also has caveats about its limitations and creating errors. In other words, the landing page has a mix of statements ... some hyping up the potential -- and some disclaimers to mention the reality and pitfalls. Excerpt from that same Copilot landing page about it being wrong more often than right: https://copilot.github.com/ https://copilot.github.com/ >How good is GitHub Copilot? >We recently benchmarked against a set of Python functions that have good test coverage in open source repos. We blanked out the function bodies and asked GitHub Copilot to fill them in. The model got this right 43% of the time on the first try, and 57% of the time when allowed 10 attempts. >Does GitHub Copilot write perfect code? >No. GitHub Copilot tries to understand your intent and to generate the best code it can, but the code it suggests may not always work, or even make sense. While we are working hard to make GitHub Copilot better, code suggested by GitHub Copilot should be carefully tested, reviewed, and vetted, like any other code.