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I work as a programmer for a Fortune 100 company that everyone on the planet has heard of. I have heard nothing from any other developers about using AI. The pr

I work as a programmer for a Fortune 100 company that everyone on the planet has heard of. I have heard nothing from any other developers about using AI. The programmers are not talking about it, the company is not talking about it. I don't know if we are behind the times or if this isn't as big a thing as you are making it out to be.

SoftTalker 3y ago
I've been doing programming for 30+ years and having a hard time seeing how AI will help me. I have templates and scaffolds for most of my reptitive work already. I feel that I'm good enough with SQL that it would take me longer to prompt an AI to write a query than it would for me to just write it. I am open to the possibility that I'm old and set in my ways but it's been a long time since the act of writing the code has been the bottleneck in my work.
- kylelahnakoski 3y ago
  The greatest benefit I have seen so far is using AI for composing code in unfamiliar frameworks and languages. You do not need to read the docs. It is a stackoverflow killer. If you already can speak the language, the best it can do is provide the boilerplate.
  - SoftTalker 3y ago
    I see. That makes sense. I don't compose code in unfamiliar frameworks and languages. I try as much as possible to use the frameworks and languages I know best. I got off of the treadmill of "framework of the year" chasing a while ago.
    - tunesmith 3y ago
      I think this is an example of how it's all different now though. Switching costs have all of a sudden decreased dramatically. There is less cost to picking the right tool for the job. Programmers that have the perfect set of templates and shortcuts and that can code in their chosen language like water and so therefore have no interest in switching to any other language... they're more at risk than the ones with broader experience.
- FeepingCreature 3y ago
  I've been using it for a few days. It's not very useful (to my usecases), but it is extremely fun. It's like pairing with a golden retriever.
tunesmith 3y ago
"Hi ChatGPT, here's a schema for an old MySQL 5.5.x table. Can you give me a "Legacy" play-slick case class and table class that reflects that schema, using Scala Play 2.8.x and play-slick 5.x? Can you rewrite that schema to a MySQL 8.x table, using your recommendations of best practices and naming conventions? Can you suggest the new schema to me in the form of a play-slick evolution? Also can you give me a slick case class and table class that reflects the new schema?" I've rewritten portions of a legacy side project in three days, what would have taken me weeks without GPT4. And beyond the simple time estimates, there are the tasks that I just simply would not have attempted otherwise.
yamtaddle 3y ago
At least so far, it's really not a big deal. It's sometimes better than search at answering questions about well-known APIs or whatever, but can't do anything very complex without running into trouble, and will happily make up plausible-looking but entirely wrong code when it doesn't know the answer. It's like a barely-got-a-passing-grade coding bootcamp grad with above-average-for-that-cohort Googling skills and a problem with dishonesty. Sometimes that's helpful, a little, but mostly it's a time-wasting distraction. What it can revolutionize in its current form is mainly limited to high-automation bullshit industries. Spammers, scammers, certain kinds of marketing content that's currently farmed out to the lowest bidder, astruturfed media campaigns, targeted mass propaganda. That part, I think will be big, but will be entirely bad for society. Unless it makes another leap forward at least as big as the last one, programming's nowhere near being threatened yet, nor, even, is most writing that's not already bullshit-heavy (though it'll help make normal writing somewhat more efficient, probably)
- tunesmith 3y ago
  The above is only true for GPT3.5 (and probably underestimates that as well). But completely false for GPT4. I had a bunch of deeply-nested map/flatmap code and it rewrote it into a short pretty for-comprehension, error free. For those that haven't learned those desugaring rules cold, it's a massive help.
  - epicureanideal 3y ago
    Isn't that the kind of thing an IDE could be able to do, just by programmatically swapping between the choice of syntax to express the same logic? Aren't there a relatively small, finite number of these cases that would cover a large percent of typical transformations, and do so with 100% reliability?
    - FeepingCreature 3y ago
      Sure, given a buggy and brittle bundle of special cases. That sort of thing can work, I'd presume, if you use an IDE that's deeply integrated with your compiler and language development. With third-party tools, version skew alone makes it untenable, let alone that the amount of transformations you could want is basically unbounded. The cool thing about GPT is that it understands code contextually and flexibly. I can literally throw it syntax that was developed specifically for a single project, that it's almost certainly never seen before, and as long as it's similar to something it's seen elsewhere, GPT can figure it out. There's no way you're getting that from an IDE feature. I got GPT 3.5 to transform a (simple) function into return-early style a few days ago. It didn't quite get it right, but it got the correct idea. I did this by typing "Transform this code into return-early style." With an IDE feature, I'd have to hope the developers had heard of and cared about return-early style in the first place, and then that their tool was powerful enough to realize when and how to apply it. (Highly unlikely, IMO.) edit: In other words, > Aren't there a relatively small, finite number of these cases that would cover a large percent of typical transformations, and do so with 100% reliability? I believe the opposite is the case.
bluedino 3y ago
I work as a programmer for a Fortune 100 company that everyone on the planet has heard of. I am sick of hearing about using AI. Everyone is talking about it, the company has meetings about it every week, we've came out with policies about using public LLM's like ChatGTP for company purposes.

SoftTalker 3y ago

I've been doing programming for 30+ years and having a hard time seeing how AI will help me. I have templates and scaffolds for most of my reptitive work already. I feel that I'm good enough with SQL that it would take me longer to prompt an AI to write a query than it would for me to just write it. I am open to the possibility that I'm old and set in my ways but it's been a long time since the act of writing the code has been the bottleneck in my work.

kylelahnakoski 3y ago
The greatest benefit I have seen so far is using AI for composing code in unfamiliar frameworks and languages. You do not need to read the docs. It is a stackoverflow killer. If you already can speak the language, the best it can do is provide the boilerplate.
- SoftTalker 3y ago
  I see. That makes sense. I don't compose code in unfamiliar frameworks and languages. I try as much as possible to use the frameworks and languages I know best. I got off of the treadmill of "framework of the year" chasing a while ago.
  - tunesmith 3y ago
    I think this is an example of how it's all different now though. Switching costs have all of a sudden decreased dramatically. There is less cost to picking the right tool for the job. Programmers that have the perfect set of templates and shortcuts and that can code in their chosen language like water and so therefore have no interest in switching to any other language... they're more at risk than the ones with broader experience.
FeepingCreature 3y ago
I've been using it for a few days. It's not very useful (to my usecases), but it is extremely fun. It's like pairing with a golden retriever.

tunesmith 3y ago

"Hi ChatGPT, here's a schema for an old MySQL 5.5.x table. Can you give me a "Legacy" play-slick case class and table class that reflects that schema, using Scala Play 2.8.x and play-slick 5.x? Can you rewrite that schema to a MySQL 8.x table, using your recommendations of best practices and naming conventions? Can you suggest the new schema to me in the form of a play-slick evolution? Also can you give me a slick case class and table class that reflects the new schema?" I've rewritten portions of a legacy side project in three days, what would have taken me weeks without GPT4. And beyond the simple time estimates, there are the tasks that I just simply would not have attempted otherwise.

yamtaddle 3y ago

At least so far, it's really not a big deal. It's sometimes better than search at answering questions about well-known APIs or whatever, but can't do anything very complex without running into trouble, and will happily make up plausible-looking but entirely wrong code when it doesn't know the answer. It's like a barely-got-a-passing-grade coding bootcamp grad with above-average-for-that-cohort Googling skills and a problem with dishonesty. Sometimes that's helpful, a little, but mostly it's a time-wasting distraction. What it can revolutionize in its current form is mainly limited to high-automation bullshit industries. Spammers, scammers, certain kinds of marketing content that's currently farmed out to the lowest bidder, astruturfed media campaigns, targeted mass propaganda. That part, I think will be big, but will be entirely bad for society. Unless it makes another leap forward at least as big as the last one, programming's nowhere near being threatened yet, nor, even, is most writing that's not already bullshit-heavy (though it'll help make normal writing somewhat more efficient, probably)

tunesmith 3y ago
The above is only true for GPT3.5 (and probably underestimates that as well). But completely false for GPT4. I had a bunch of deeply-nested map/flatmap code and it rewrote it into a short pretty for-comprehension, error free. For those that haven't learned those desugaring rules cold, it's a massive help.
- epicureanideal 3y ago
  Isn't that the kind of thing an IDE could be able to do, just by programmatically swapping between the choice of syntax to express the same logic? Aren't there a relatively small, finite number of these cases that would cover a large percent of typical transformations, and do so with 100% reliability?
  - FeepingCreature 3y ago
    Sure, given a buggy and brittle bundle of special cases. That sort of thing can work, I'd presume, if you use an IDE that's deeply integrated with your compiler and language development. With third-party tools, version skew alone makes it untenable, let alone that the amount of transformations you could want is basically unbounded. The cool thing about GPT is that it understands code contextually and flexibly. I can literally throw it syntax that was developed specifically for a single project, that it's almost certainly never seen before, and as long as it's similar to something it's seen elsewhere, GPT can figure it out. There's no way you're getting that from an IDE feature. I got GPT 3.5 to transform a (simple) function into return-early style a few days ago. It didn't quite get it right, but it got the correct idea. I did this by typing "Transform this code into return-early style." With an IDE feature, I'd have to hope the developers had heard of and cared about return-early style in the first place, and then that their tool was powerful enough to realize when and how to apply it. (Highly unlikely, IMO.) edit: In other words, > Aren't there a relatively small, finite number of these cases that would cover a large percent of typical transformations, and do so with 100% reliability? I believe the opposite is the case.

bluedino 3y ago

I work as a programmer for a Fortune 100 company that everyone on the planet has heard of. I am sick of hearing about using AI. Everyone is talking about it, the company has meetings about it every week, we've came out with policies about using public LLM's like ChatGTP for company purposes.