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Concern over this is the #1 reason I have not yet tried to use Copilot. For my hobby projects I don't care enough to pay for it. And if it's phoning home propri

by jghn 4y ago

Concern over this is the #1 reason I have not yet tried to use Copilot. For my hobby projects I don't care enough to pay for it. And if it's phoning home proprietary code, I can't allow that to happen.

madisp 4y ago
I use GitHub so not really a concern for me, they have my code already.
- mplanchard 4y ago
  IIRC they didn’t train on private repos though, so using copilot in a private (github) repo will potentially open up your proprietary code to being used in that way.
  - insane_dreamer 4y ago
    No, the model doesn't train on your private code (which is good but also somewhat limiting as in my experience it doesn't provide useful answers that are very specific to your codebase); it's good for generic code though and saves time looking stuff up.
vintermann 4y ago
Eh, as long as my employers don't care (they don't), I don't care. I have no illusions that my code/our code will give Microsoft any valuable training data it couldn't trivially get elsewhere.
- jghn 4y ago
  Mine does, and therein lies my issue.
  - bongobingo1 4y ago
    If that's the case, would co-pilot be useful anyway? Or are you off the range where suggestions wont help?
    - jghn 4y ago
      In theory there are no rules about importing code, beyond the usual licensing issues. But people use SO and such all of the time, right? If one *really* wanted to do a global audit of improperly imported code, we'd all have bigger problems. So from that perspective it's status quo. But I don't want to be the person caught uploading proprietary code to another company's servers. It's not a major issue, and I doubt it'd ever be a practical problem. But fear of punishment keeps me away.
  - 2gremlin181 4y ago
    IMO Copilot for Business has a very reasonable data collection policy. They discard any code snippets once the suggestion is returned. https://github.com/features/copilot https://github.com/features/copilot
  - mlboss 4y ago
    You can always use https://github.com/salesforce/CodeGen https://github.com/salesforce/CodeGen . But it does require managing the model hosting. You can use fauxpilot to mimic copilot functionality https://github.com/fauxpilot/fauxpilot https://github.com/fauxpilot/fauxpilot
programmarchy 4y ago
It’s worth it even for hobby projects, imo. It reduces the time spent on mundane tasks and allows you to think at a higher level and just move faster. Maybe you achieve a level of zen from implementing utility level code, similar to how some people might still write assembly code, but otherwise it’s a valuable tool/skill to learn. Tangentially, I think there’s some fear associated with adopting AI tools, perhaps because developers feel like their skill sets are being displaced. And they are but there’s headroom e.g. assembly programmers learned C. There seems to be some post-hoc rationalizations being put forth to avoid that fear, but my sense is that developers who don’t cultivate this new skill set will fall behind.
- discreteevent 4y ago
  > my sense is that developers who don’t cultivate this new skill set will fall behind That might be true but it's an easy skillset to pick up compared to programming. The bigger danger is that new developers will lean on AI so much that they do not pick up the fundamentals of programming in which case they will definitely be left behind.
  - aliasxneo 4y ago
    Many, probably. However, the curious types will likely be further enhanced by AI. I've never been one to take code at face value, and I have been enjoying sessions with ChatGPT asking all sorts of questions about some of the stuff it produces. The answer is usually sufficient, and in cases where it's not, I've been given enough background context to know where to find the answer online or in books. Honestly, I've seen myself master many more additional things since I've started including it in my daily routine.
  - blibble 4y ago
    the result of this will be similar to hiring infosys hundreds of thousands of lines of buggy incomprehensible boilerplate that doesn't work on anything but the easy cases then you have to rip the entire thing apart and start again with people that know what they're doing
- unshavedyak 4y ago

by jghn 4y ago

madisp 4y ago

I use GitHub so not really a concern for me, they have my code already.

mplanchard 4y ago
IIRC they didn’t train on private repos though, so using copilot in a private (github) repo will potentially open up your proprietary code to being used in that way.
- insane_dreamer 4y ago
  No, the model doesn't train on your private code (which is good but also somewhat limiting as in my experience it doesn't provide useful answers that are very specific to your codebase); it's good for generic code though and saves time looking stuff up.

vintermann 4y ago

Eh, as long as my employers don't care (they don't), I don't care. I have no illusions that my code/our code will give Microsoft any valuable training data it couldn't trivially get elsewhere.

jghn 4y ago
Mine does, and therein lies my issue.
- bongobingo1 4y ago
  If that's the case, would co-pilot be useful anyway? Or are you off the range where suggestions wont help?
  - jghn 4y ago
    In theory there are no rules about importing code, beyond the usual licensing issues. But people use SO and such all of the time, right? If one *really* wanted to do a global audit of improperly imported code, we'd all have bigger problems. So from that perspective it's status quo. But I don't want to be the person caught uploading proprietary code to another company's servers. It's not a major issue, and I doubt it'd ever be a practical problem. But fear of punishment keeps me away.
- 2gremlin181 4y ago
  IMO Copilot for Business has a very reasonable data collection policy. They discard any code snippets once the suggestion is returned. https://github.com/features/copilot https://github.com/features/copilot
- mlboss 4y ago
  You can always use https://github.com/salesforce/CodeGen https://github.com/salesforce/CodeGen . But it does require managing the model hosting. You can use fauxpilot to mimic copilot functionality https://github.com/fauxpilot/fauxpilot https://github.com/fauxpilot/fauxpilot

programmarchy 4y ago

It’s worth it even for hobby projects, imo. It reduces the time spent on mundane tasks and allows you to think at a higher level and just move faster. Maybe you achieve a level of zen from implementing utility level code, similar to how some people might still write assembly code, but otherwise it’s a valuable tool/skill to learn. Tangentially, I think there’s some fear associated with adopting AI tools, perhaps because developers feel like their skill sets are being displaced. And they are but there’s headroom e.g. assembly programmers learned C. There seems to be some post-hoc rationalizations being put forth to avoid that fear, but my sense is that developers who don’t cultivate this new skill set will fall behind.

discreteevent 4y ago
> my sense is that developers who don’t cultivate this new skill set will fall behind That might be true but it's an easy skillset to pick up compared to programming. The bigger danger is that new developers will lean on AI so much that they do not pick up the fundamentals of programming in which case they will definitely be left behind.
- aliasxneo 4y ago
  Many, probably. However, the curious types will likely be further enhanced by AI. I've never been one to take code at face value, and I have been enjoying sessions with ChatGPT asking all sorts of questions about some of the stuff it produces. The answer is usually sufficient, and in cases where it's not, I've been given enough background context to know where to find the answer online or in books. Honestly, I've seen myself master many more additional things since I've started including it in my daily routine.
- blibble 4y ago
  the result of this will be similar to hiring infosys hundreds of thousands of lines of buggy incomprehensible boilerplate that doesn't work on anything but the easy cases then you have to rip the entire thing apart and start again with people that know what they're doing
unshavedyak 4y ago