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Google CEO says ‘vibe coding’ made software development ‘so much more enjoyable’

16 points by ashishgupta2209 11mo ago

codingdave 11mo ago
Biz leaders who are seeking to profit off AI sure do have a positive view of AI.
cluckindan 11mo ago
Finally, the CEO can feel like they’re producing something of value.
- jerlam 11mo ago
  I'm not excited to review the CEO's AI-written PR.
antibull 11mo ago
[dead]
chasing0entropy 11mo ago
Reading this just makes me think of yesterday's post - vibe code in turbo mode, Gemini Antigravty wipes the entire storage drive partition because it missed a quotation in function code it wrote and ran without checking. Edit: for those who don't frequent HN or reddit every day: https://old.reddit.com/r/google_antigravity/comments/1p82or6/google_antigravity_just_deleted_the_contents_of/ https://old.reddit.com/r/google_antigravity/comments/1p82or6...
- bryanrasmussen 11mo ago
  it used to be you needed to be an idiotic noob to do that to your company but now you can automate it and do it at scale, idiotic noobs are expensive and it costs a lot to hire enough to wreck everything but vibe coding is cheap and inexpensive to bring awesome self-destructive power!
Chance-Device 11mo ago
It does though. That’s a separate issue from the inevitable layoffs and any bugs introduced along the way, but he’s not wrong.
- WhyOhWhyQ 11mo ago
  It depends on how you use it. I was running 15 agents at once, 12 hours a day for a month straight because it was more optimal to add more, and that wasn't very enjoyable. Now I'm back to writing code the enjoyable way, with minor LLM assistance here and there.
- bluefirebrand 11mo ago
  Speak for yourself. I think he's extremely wrong I think if all you care about is the outcome then sure, you might enjoy AI coding more If you enjoy the problem solving process (and care about quality) then doing it by hand is way, way more enjoyable
  - Chance-Device 11mo ago
    If you don’t care about outcome then all you’re doing is playing a video game.
    - quuxplusone 11mo ago
      Sure, but the headline wasn't "Google CEO says ‘vibe coding’ made software development ‘so much less like a video game.’" In fact since many people think video games are enjoyable, making software development less gamelike might make it less enjoyable. (But would further gamification make it more enjoyable? No, IMO. So maybe all we learn here is that people don't like change in any direction.)
    - bluefirebrand 11mo ago
      If writing code by hand is like playing a videogame, then vibe coding is like playing a slot machine Argue about the value of video games all you like, I would still place them above slot machines any day
aleph_minus_one 11mo ago
This links to > https://indianexpress.com/article/technology/tech-news-technology/google-ceo-sundar-pichai-says-vibe-coding-has-made-software-development-so-much-more-enjoyable-10393752/ https://indianexpress.com/article/technology/tech-news-techn... dang, please replace the link.
bluefirebrand 11mo ago
You know there are lots of things that make software development more enjoyable Having a private office instead of an open floor plan for instance Or not working in the JIRA two week sprint format Or not having to work with offshore teams that push the burden of quality control onto you My point is I bet that the Google CEO (and basically every other software CEO) doesn't actually care if software development is enjoyable or not
jimnotgym 11mo ago
Yes it helps you write all the boiler plate code to do straightforward repetetive things. What would be even better would be simple code to do simple things
raldi 11mo ago
My wife noticed that I don't mind being interrupted when programming anymore; between the less-intense level of concentration required now and the always-present transcript, it's not like a collapsing mental house of cards to look up for a few minutes and talk about something else.
thepasswordapp 11mo ago
Been "vibe coding" for 8 months building thepassword.app - AI browser automation that changes passwords across websites. The enjoyment factor is real. The iteration speed with Claude Code is insane. But the model's suggestions still need guardrails. For security-focused apps especially, you can't just accept what the LLM generates. We spent weeks ensuring passwords never touch the LLM context - that's not something a vibe-coded solution catches by default. The productivity gains are real, but so is the need for human oversight on the security-critical parts.
- stogot 11mo ago
  How do you ensure this? That pattern could be a useful feature in hundreds of apps being built by other developers if you turn it into a library
  - thepasswordapp 11mo ago
    Good question - and yes, this should probably be a library. The core approach: browser-use's Agent class accepts a `credentials` parameter that gets passed to custom action functions but never included in the LLM prompt. So when the agent needs to fill a password field, it calls a custom `enter_password()` function that receives the credential via this secure channel rather than having it in the visible task context. We forked browser-use to add this (github.com/anthropics/browser-use doesn't have it upstream yet). The modification is in `agent/service.py` - adding `credentials` to the Agent constructor and threading it through to the tool registry. Key parts: 1. Passwords passed via `sensitive_data` dict 2. Custom action functions receive credentials as parameters 3. LLM only sees "call enter_password()" not the actual value 4. Redaction at logging layer as defense-in-depth Would be happy to clean this up into a standalone pattern/PR. The trickiest part is that it requires changes to the core Agent class, not just custom actions on top.
- 000ooo000 11mo ago
  There is no way I would provide the password I use on multiple sites to some random app, and there's absolutely no way I'd do that if I had any inkling it was vibe coded.
ChrisArchitect 11mo ago
Source: https://blog.google/technology/ai/sundar-pichai-ai-release-notes-podcast/ https://blog.google/technology/ai/sundar-pichai-ai-release-n... (video: https://youtu.be/iFqDyWFuw1c https://youtu.be/iFqDyWFuw1c)
AlexeyBrin 11mo ago
How many hours per day is Google CEO "enjoying" the pleasures of (vibe) coding ?
LikeBeans 11mo ago
No buddy, you're replacing the doer engineers that built your company and made you rich with some form of automation.

codingdave 11mo ago

Biz leaders who are seeking to profit off AI sure do have a positive view of AI.

cluckindan 11mo ago

Finally, the CEO can feel like they’re producing something of value.

jerlam 11mo ago
I'm not excited to review the CEO's AI-written PR.

antibull 11mo ago

[dead]

chasing0entropy 11mo ago

Reading this just makes me think of yesterday's post - vibe code in turbo mode, Gemini Antigravty wipes the entire storage drive partition because it missed a quotation in function code it wrote and ran without checking. Edit: for those who don't frequent HN or reddit every day: https://old.reddit.com/r/google_antigravity/comments/1p82or6/google_antigravity_just_deleted_the_contents_of/ https://old.reddit.com/r/google_antigravity/comments/1p82or6...

bryanrasmussen 11mo ago
it used to be you needed to be an idiotic noob to do that to your company but now you can automate it and do it at scale, idiotic noobs are expensive and it costs a lot to hire enough to wreck everything but vibe coding is cheap and inexpensive to bring awesome self-destructive power!

Chance-Device 11mo ago

It does though. That’s a separate issue from the inevitable layoffs and any bugs introduced along the way, but he’s not wrong.

WhyOhWhyQ 11mo ago
It depends on how you use it. I was running 15 agents at once, 12 hours a day for a month straight because it was more optimal to add more, and that wasn't very enjoyable. Now I'm back to writing code the enjoyable way, with minor LLM assistance here and there.
bluefirebrand 11mo ago
Speak for yourself. I think he's extremely wrong I think if all you care about is the outcome then sure, you might enjoy AI coding more If you enjoy the problem solving process (and care about quality) then doing it by hand is way, way more enjoyable
- Chance-Device 11mo ago
  If you don’t care about outcome then all you’re doing is playing a video game.
  - quuxplusone 11mo ago
    Sure, but the headline wasn't "Google CEO says ‘vibe coding’ made software development ‘so much less like a video game.’" In fact since many people think video games are enjoyable, making software development less gamelike might make it less enjoyable. (But would further gamification make it more enjoyable? No, IMO. So maybe all we learn here is that people don't like change in any direction.)
  - bluefirebrand 11mo ago
    If writing code by hand is like playing a videogame, then vibe coding is like playing a slot machine Argue about the value of video games all you like, I would still place them above slot machines any day

aleph_minus_one 11mo ago

This links to > https://indianexpress.com/article/technology/tech-news-technology/google-ceo-sundar-pichai-says-vibe-coding-has-made-software-development-so-much-more-enjoyable-10393752/ https://indianexpress.com/article/technology/tech-news-techn... dang, please replace the link.

bluefirebrand 11mo ago

You know there are lots of things that make software development more enjoyable Having a private office instead of an open floor plan for instance Or not working in the JIRA two week sprint format Or not having to work with offshore teams that push the burden of quality control onto you My point is I bet that the Google CEO (and basically every other software CEO) doesn't actually care if software development is enjoyable or not

jimnotgym 11mo ago

Yes it helps you write all the boiler plate code to do straightforward repetetive things. What would be even better would be simple code to do simple things

raldi 11mo ago

My wife noticed that I don't mind being interrupted when programming anymore; between the less-intense level of concentration required now and the always-present transcript, it's not like a collapsing mental house of cards to look up for a few minutes and talk about something else.

thepasswordapp 11mo ago

Been "vibe coding" for 8 months building thepassword.app - AI browser automation that changes passwords across websites. The enjoyment factor is real. The iteration speed with Claude Code is insane. But the model's suggestions still need guardrails. For security-focused apps especially, you can't just accept what the LLM generates. We spent weeks ensuring passwords never touch the LLM context - that's not something a vibe-coded solution catches by default. The productivity gains are real, but so is the need for human oversight on the security-critical parts.

stogot 11mo ago
How do you ensure this? That pattern could be a useful feature in hundreds of apps being built by other developers if you turn it into a library
- thepasswordapp 11mo ago
  Good question - and yes, this should probably be a library. The core approach: browser-use's Agent class accepts a `credentials` parameter that gets passed to custom action functions but never included in the LLM prompt. So when the agent needs to fill a password field, it calls a custom `enter_password()` function that receives the credential via this secure channel rather than having it in the visible task context. We forked browser-use to add this (github.com/anthropics/browser-use doesn't have it upstream yet). The modification is in `agent/service.py` - adding `credentials` to the Agent constructor and threading it through to the tool registry. Key parts: 1. Passwords passed via `sensitive_data` dict 2. Custom action functions receive credentials as parameters 3. LLM only sees "call enter_password()" not the actual value 4. Redaction at logging layer as defense-in-depth Would be happy to clean this up into a standalone pattern/PR. The trickiest part is that it requires changes to the core Agent class, not just custom actions on top.
000ooo000 11mo ago
There is no way I would provide the password I use on multiple sites to some random app, and there's absolutely no way I'd do that if I had any inkling it was vibe coded.

ChrisArchitect 11mo ago

Source: https://blog.google/technology/ai/sundar-pichai-ai-release-notes-podcast/ https://blog.google/technology/ai/sundar-pichai-ai-release-n... (video: https://youtu.be/iFqDyWFuw1c https://youtu.be/iFqDyWFuw1c)

AlexeyBrin 11mo ago

How many hours per day is Google CEO "enjoying" the pleasures of (vibe) coding ?

LikeBeans 11mo ago

No buddy, you're replacing the doer engineers that built your company and made you rich with some form of automation.