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We aren't hiring new software engineers. Anyone skilled enough to code can now codes in any language. Jobs aren't being replaced but no longer added. I also

We aren't hiring new software engineers. Anyone skilled enough to code can now codes in any language. Jobs aren't being replaced but no longer added. I also demonstrated how an intern (1st year) was able to replace a 5 year experience position after six weeks of working with AI. We're seeing a 5x acceleration in shipping after our first year with limited exposure.

XorNot 2y ago
What is your company? Because honestly: I straight up do not believe this.
- teaearlgraycold 2y ago
  Software engineering is 10% knowing how to code and 90% knowing what to code. So I don't buy it either. I use LLMs daily for programming. Sometimes they're helpful. But I see them like one of our first power tools (comparable to the language servers and compilers in our toolbelt).
  - seanp2k2 2y ago
    At BigCos, software engineering is also spending 70% of your day in meetings or handling housekeeping chores in JIRA / Monday / Airtable / Notion / GDocs. I’d love to send an AI agent to meet with PMs to give status updates and take notes if any of their needs change if it could actually do those things efficiently and reliably. Right now, it’d be about the equivalent of having a PM call a phone tree system and leave a voicemail that might get transcribed 85% correctly.
    - SR2Z 2y ago
      This sounds like you want an AI to turn bullet points into text so that the PM's AI can turn it back into bullet points and vice-versa. Don't you think that it might be more efficient to just communicate with the bullet points?
      - kdmtctl 2y ago
        Reminds of the Google Translate model that eventually invented its own internal intermediate language. Which would be a nice touch in this kind of applications.
- Tadpole9181 2y ago
  I wouldn't go this far, it's a really hit-or-miss thing, but as someone who is seeing it heavily integrated... Our days are numbered. That number, in my opinion, is closer to a decade, but I have folk at a junior level building out entire internal tools in a couple days what would have taken weeks. The operations crew is having it automate metrics rapidly. Senior developers are increasing their throughout rates. Things come back to code review in a generally better state because folk say "hey, review this for me". Is it a real developer? Not at all. Is it affecting our hiring or anything? Nah. But it's already a huge help and rapidly getting better with new models (o3 / deepseek), tooling (CSP and agents), and integration (cline, cursor, memory prompting).
  - pizzafeelsright 2y ago
    Ten years from now we will see Alexa doing the work of three FTEs output from admin, accounting, data modeling in seconds. Idea to bank to pull funds to 3d print to market validation in a day.
- pizzafeelsright 2y ago
  Not saying obviously so take it from this pizza fan that I've seen some incredible advances. Example from last week: pasted my terraform that was using internal custom modules and prompt that based on this code build additional services not yet built using the module output so they could all communicate. First run. 100% accurate. Zero typing after paste and prompt. 2 minutes of time. It probably saved me an hour at least of looking up module output and documentation with the additional services. It may be minor or simple yet I now have an additional hour.
iwontberude 2y ago
You can replace a 5 year experienced position with anything you want, but it doesn’t mean it will lead to good business outcomes.
- seanp2k2 2y ago
  5x faster react boilerplate! #winning
  - iwontberude 2y ago
    Damn sup Sean, happy to see you. Good memories gopeding around MTV. Yeah I just unmasked myself, but just to you :)
- pizzafeelsright 2y ago
  Yet it has and here we are.
- pllbnk 2y ago
  We have a notorious junior LLM addict in the team. All experienced engineers are extremely annoyed reviewing his code due to endless stream of merge requests containing repetitive code which often plainly doesn't work in any other than the happiest of scenarios and the fact that it doesn't work can be seen from space (i.e. no testing needed, it's obvious while reviewing). While every single developer now uses LLM, the outcome really depends on how one is using it.
  - iwontberude 2y ago
    I work at a mag 7 company with teams of SWE who don’t use LLM for their work at all (because they suck and have data privacy issues) and some have successfully resisted having their work consumed into an LLM. We read docs and apply paradigms we have learned, we are fast at writing correct code and so it doesn’t offer any benefits.
bigstrat2003 2y ago
> Anyone skilled enough to code can now codes in any language. That was always true. Once you learn how to program, it doesn't take a ton of effort to learn another language. It takes more time and effort to master a new language, but that's still just as true as it ever was.

XorNot 2y ago

What is your company? Because honestly: I straight up do not believe this.

teaearlgraycold 2y ago
Software engineering is 10% knowing how to code and 90% knowing what to code. So I don't buy it either. I use LLMs daily for programming. Sometimes they're helpful. But I see them like one of our first power tools (comparable to the language servers and compilers in our toolbelt).
- seanp2k2 2y ago
  At BigCos, software engineering is also spending 70% of your day in meetings or handling housekeeping chores in JIRA / Monday / Airtable / Notion / GDocs. I’d love to send an AI agent to meet with PMs to give status updates and take notes if any of their needs change if it could actually do those things efficiently and reliably. Right now, it’d be about the equivalent of having a PM call a phone tree system and leave a voicemail that might get transcribed 85% correctly.
  - SR2Z 2y ago
    This sounds like you want an AI to turn bullet points into text so that the PM's AI can turn it back into bullet points and vice-versa. Don't you think that it might be more efficient to just communicate with the bullet points?
    - kdmtctl 2y ago
      Reminds of the Google Translate model that eventually invented its own internal intermediate language. Which would be a nice touch in this kind of applications.
Tadpole9181 2y ago
I wouldn't go this far, it's a really hit-or-miss thing, but as someone who is seeing it heavily integrated... Our days are numbered. That number, in my opinion, is closer to a decade, but I have folk at a junior level building out entire internal tools in a couple days what would have taken weeks. The operations crew is having it automate metrics rapidly. Senior developers are increasing their throughout rates. Things come back to code review in a generally better state because folk say "hey, review this for me". Is it a real developer? Not at all. Is it affecting our hiring or anything? Nah. But it's already a huge help and rapidly getting better with new models (o3 / deepseek), tooling (CSP and agents), and integration (cline, cursor, memory prompting).
- pizzafeelsright 2y ago
  Ten years from now we will see Alexa doing the work of three FTEs output from admin, accounting, data modeling in seconds. Idea to bank to pull funds to 3d print to market validation in a day.
pizzafeelsright 2y ago
Not saying obviously so take it from this pizza fan that I've seen some incredible advances. Example from last week: pasted my terraform that was using internal custom modules and prompt that based on this code build additional services not yet built using the module output so they could all communicate. First run. 100% accurate. Zero typing after paste and prompt. 2 minutes of time. It probably saved me an hour at least of looking up module output and documentation with the additional services. It may be minor or simple yet I now have an additional hour.

iwontberude 2y ago

You can replace a 5 year experienced position with anything you want, but it doesn’t mean it will lead to good business outcomes.

seanp2k2 2y ago
5x faster react boilerplate! #winning
- iwontberude 2y ago
  Damn sup Sean, happy to see you. Good memories gopeding around MTV. Yeah I just unmasked myself, but just to you :)
pizzafeelsright 2y ago
Yet it has and here we are.
pllbnk 2y ago
We have a notorious junior LLM addict in the team. All experienced engineers are extremely annoyed reviewing his code due to endless stream of merge requests containing repetitive code which often plainly doesn't work in any other than the happiest of scenarios and the fact that it doesn't work can be seen from space (i.e. no testing needed, it's obvious while reviewing). While every single developer now uses LLM, the outcome really depends on how one is using it.
- iwontberude 2y ago
  I work at a mag 7 company with teams of SWE who don’t use LLM for their work at all (because they suck and have data privacy issues) and some have successfully resisted having their work consumed into an LLM. We read docs and apply paradigms we have learned, we are fast at writing correct code and so it doesn’t offer any benefits.

bigstrat2003 2y ago

> Anyone skilled enough to code can now codes in any language. That was always true. Once you learn how to program, it doesn't take a ton of effort to learn another language. It takes more time and effort to master a new language, but that's still just as true as it ever was.