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> The article sort of goes sideways with this idea but pointing out that AI coding robs you a deep understanding of the code it produces is a valid and importan

> The article sort of goes sideways with this idea but pointing out that AI coding robs you a deep understanding of the code it produces is a valid and important criticism of AI coding. Why? Code has always been the artifact. Thinking about and understanding the domain clearly and solving problems is where the intrinsic value is at (but I'd suspect that in the future this, too, will go away).

guy_5676 1y ago
Code isn't an "artifact", it's the actual product that you are building and delivering. You can use flowery language and pontificate about the importance of the problem domain if you like, but at the end of the day we are producing a low level sequences of instructions that will be executed by a real world device. There has always been, and likely will always be, value in understanding exactly what you are asking the computer to do
- HPsquared 1y ago
  Code is just one way of representing a specification.
- alexandre_m 1y ago
  Product != Artifact Artifacts are snapshots of system knowledge (code, builds, docs, configs, etc.). The product is the living whole that emerges from these artifacts working together and delivering value.
  - guy_5676 1y ago
    I'm familiar with "artifact" being used to describe the inconsequential and easy to reproduce output of some deterministic process (e.g. build artifact). Even given the terminology you provide here it doesn't change the content of my point above. When I see someone dismissing the code as a small irrelevant part of the task of writing software, it's like hearing that the low-level design and physical construction of a bridge is an irrelevant side-effect of my desire to cross a body of water. Like, maybe that's true in a philosophical sense, but at the end of the day we are building a real-world bridge that needs to conform to real-world constraints, and every little detail is going to be important. I wouldn't want to cross a bridge built by someone who thinks otherwise.
- enraged_camel 1y ago
  In most domains, code is not the actual product. Data is. Code is how you record, modify and delete data. But it is ultimately data that has meaning and value. This is why we have the idiom: “Don’t tell me what the code says—show me the data, and I’ll tell you what the code does.”
hansonkd 1y ago
Reminds me of critisms of python decades ago. that you wouldn't understand what the "real code" was doing since you were using a scripting language. But then over the years it showed tremendous value and many unicorns were built by focusing on higher level details and not lower level code
- bootsmann 1y ago
  Comparing LLMs to programming languages is a fake equivalence. I don’t have to write assembly because LLVM will do that for me correctly in 100% of the cases, while AI might or might not (especially the more I move away from template crud apps)
  - nharada 1y ago
    it might be functionally correct but if you wrote it yourself it could be orders of magnitude faster
    - jowea 1y ago
      We've been on the Electron era long enough to know that developer time is more expensive than CPU time.
      - Jensson 1y ago
        That is a myth, cpu time is time spent waiting around by your users as the cpu is taking seconds to do something that could be instant, if you have millions of users and that happens every day that quickly adds up to many years worth of time. It might be true if you just look at development cost, but if you look at value as a whole it isn't. And even just development cost its often not true, since time spent waiting around by the developer for tests to run and things to start also slows things down, taking a bit of time there to reduce cpu time is well worth it just to get things done faster.
        jowea 1y ago
bloomca 1y ago
Code is the final artifact after everything is shipped. But while the development is active, it is more than that (at least for now), as you need to know implementation details even if you are really proficient at the domain knowledge. Although I do agree that there is a possibility that we'll build a relatively reliable abstraction using LLMs at some point, so this issue will go away. There probably be some restrictions, but I think it is possible.
- fragmede 1y ago
  Binaries (or their equivalent) are the final artifact. Source code can (and has been) lost.

guy_5676 1y ago

Code isn't an "artifact", it's the actual product that you are building and delivering. You can use flowery language and pontificate about the importance of the problem domain if you like, but at the end of the day we are producing a low level sequences of instructions that will be executed by a real world device. There has always been, and likely will always be, value in understanding exactly what you are asking the computer to do

HPsquared 1y ago
Code is just one way of representing a specification.
alexandre_m 1y ago
Product != Artifact Artifacts are snapshots of system knowledge (code, builds, docs, configs, etc.). The product is the living whole that emerges from these artifacts working together and delivering value.
- guy_5676 1y ago
  I'm familiar with "artifact" being used to describe the inconsequential and easy to reproduce output of some deterministic process (e.g. build artifact). Even given the terminology you provide here it doesn't change the content of my point above. When I see someone dismissing the code as a small irrelevant part of the task of writing software, it's like hearing that the low-level design and physical construction of a bridge is an irrelevant side-effect of my desire to cross a body of water. Like, maybe that's true in a philosophical sense, but at the end of the day we are building a real-world bridge that needs to conform to real-world constraints, and every little detail is going to be important. I wouldn't want to cross a bridge built by someone who thinks otherwise.
enraged_camel 1y ago
In most domains, code is not the actual product. Data is. Code is how you record, modify and delete data. But it is ultimately data that has meaning and value. This is why we have the idiom: “Don’t tell me what the code says—show me the data, and I’ll tell you what the code does.”

hansonkd 1y ago

Reminds me of critisms of python decades ago. that you wouldn't understand what the "real code" was doing since you were using a scripting language. But then over the years it showed tremendous value and many unicorns were built by focusing on higher level details and not lower level code

bootsmann 1y ago
Comparing LLMs to programming languages is a fake equivalence. I don’t have to write assembly because LLVM will do that for me correctly in 100% of the cases, while AI might or might not (especially the more I move away from template crud apps)
- nharada 1y ago
  it might be functionally correct but if you wrote it yourself it could be orders of magnitude faster
  - jowea 1y ago
    We've been on the Electron era long enough to know that developer time is more expensive than CPU time.
    - Jensson 1y ago
      That is a myth, cpu time is time spent waiting around by your users as the cpu is taking seconds to do something that could be instant, if you have millions of users and that happens every day that quickly adds up to many years worth of time. It might be true if you just look at development cost, but if you look at value as a whole it isn't. And even just development cost its often not true, since time spent waiting around by the developer for tests to run and things to start also slows things down, taking a bit of time there to reduce cpu time is well worth it just to get things done faster.
      - jowea 1y ago

bloomca 1y ago

Code is the final artifact after everything is shipped. But while the development is active, it is more than that (at least for now), as you need to know implementation details even if you are really proficient at the domain knowledge. Although I do agree that there is a possibility that we'll build a relatively reliable abstraction using LLMs at some point, so this issue will go away. There probably be some restrictions, but I think it is possible.

fragmede 1y ago
Binaries (or their equivalent) are the final artifact. Source code can (and has been) lost.