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There are so many prompting guides at the moment. Personally I think they are quite unnecessary. If you take the time to use these tools, build familiarity with

There are so many prompting guides at the moment. Personally I think they are quite unnecessary. If you take the time to use these tools, build familiarity with them and the way they work, the prompt you should use becomes quite obvious.

Disposal8433 1y ago
It reminds me that we had the same hype and FOMO when Google became popular. Books were being written on the subject and you had to buy those or you would become a caveman in a near future. What happened is that anyone could learn the whole thing in a day and that was it, no need to debate about whether you would miss anything if you didn't knew all those tools.
- verbify 1y ago
  I certainly have better Google fu than some relatives who are always asking me to find something online.
  - Timwi 1y ago
    I love the term “Google fu”. We should call it prompt fu or LLM fu instead of “prompt engineering”.
- wiseowise 1y ago
  You’re only proving the opposite: there’s definitely a difference between “experienced Google user” and someone who just puts random words and expects to find what they need.
  - marliechiller 1y ago
    Is there? I feel like google has optimised heavily for the caveman input rather than the enlightened search warrior nowadays
sokoloff 1y ago
I think there are people for whom reading a prompt guide (or watching an experienced user) will be very valuable. Many people just won't put any conscious thought into trying to get better on their own, though some of them will read or watch one thing on the topic. I will readily admit to picking up several useful tips from watching other people use these tools and from discussing them with peers. That's improvement that I don't think I achieve by solely using the tools on my own.
TheCowboy 1y ago
It's at least useful for seeing how other people are being productive with these tools. I also sometimes find a clever idea that improves that I'm already doing. And documenting the current state of this space as well. It's easy to have tried doing something a year ago and think they're still bad. I also usually prefer researching some area before reinventing the wheel by trial/failure myself. I appreciate when people share what they've discovered with their own their time, as I don't always have all the time in the world to explore it as I would if I were still a teen.
awb 1y ago
Many years ago there were guides on how to write user stories: “As a [role], I want to be able to do [task] so I can achieve [objective]”, because it was useful to teach high-level thinkers how to communicate requirements with less ambiguity. It may seem simple, but in my experience even brilliant developers can miss or misinterpret unstructured requirements, through no fault of their own.
baby 1y ago
There are definitely tricks that are not obvious. For example it seems like you should delete all politeness (e.g. "please")

Disposal8433 1y ago

It reminds me that we had the same hype and FOMO when Google became popular. Books were being written on the subject and you had to buy those or you would become a caveman in a near future. What happened is that anyone could learn the whole thing in a day and that was it, no need to debate about whether you would miss anything if you didn't knew all those tools.

verbify 1y ago
I certainly have better Google fu than some relatives who are always asking me to find something online.
- Timwi 1y ago
  I love the term “Google fu”. We should call it prompt fu or LLM fu instead of “prompt engineering”.
wiseowise 1y ago
You’re only proving the opposite: there’s definitely a difference between “experienced Google user” and someone who just puts random words and expects to find what they need.
- marliechiller 1y ago
  Is there? I feel like google has optimised heavily for the caveman input rather than the enlightened search warrior nowadays

sokoloff 1y ago

I think there are people for whom reading a prompt guide (or watching an experienced user) will be very valuable. Many people just won't put any conscious thought into trying to get better on their own, though some of them will read or watch one thing on the topic. I will readily admit to picking up several useful tips from watching other people use these tools and from discussing them with peers. That's improvement that I don't think I achieve by solely using the tools on my own.

TheCowboy 1y ago

It's at least useful for seeing how other people are being productive with these tools. I also sometimes find a clever idea that improves that I'm already doing. And documenting the current state of this space as well. It's easy to have tried doing something a year ago and think they're still bad. I also usually prefer researching some area before reinventing the wheel by trial/failure myself. I appreciate when people share what they've discovered with their own their time, as I don't always have all the time in the world to explore it as I would if I were still a teen.

awb 1y ago

Many years ago there were guides on how to write user stories: “As a [role], I want to be able to do [task] so I can achieve [objective]”, because it was useful to teach high-level thinkers how to communicate requirements with less ambiguity. It may seem simple, but in my experience even brilliant developers can miss or misinterpret unstructured requirements, through no fault of their own.

baby 1y ago

There are definitely tricks that are not obvious. For example it seems like you should delete all politeness (e.g. "please")