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>If it did, then the specification would be the code. Except you can't run english on your computer. Also the specification can be spread out through various p

>If it did, then the specification would be the code. Except you can't run english on your computer. Also the specification can be spread out through various parts of the code base or internal wikis. The beauty of AI is that it is connected to all of this data so it can figure out what's the best way to currently implement something as opposed to regular code which requires constant maintenance to keep current. At least for the purposes I need it for, I have found it reliable enough to generate correct code each time.

free_bip 10mo ago
What do you mean? I can run English on my computer. There are multiple apps out there that will let me type "delete all files starting with" hacker"" into the terminal and end up with the correct end result. And before you say "that's indirect!", it genuinely does not matter how indirect the execution is or how many "translation layers" there are. Python for example goes through at least 3 translation layers, raw .py -> Python bytecode -> bytecode interpreter -> machine code. Adding one more automated translation layer does not suddenly make it "not code."
- charcircuit 10mo ago
  I mean that the prompt is not like code. It's not a set of instructions that encodes what the computer will do. It includes instructions for how an AI can create the necessary code. Just because a specification is "translated" into code, that doesn't mean the input is necessarily code.
  - yaris 10mo ago
    What is conceptually different between prompts and code? Code is also not always what the computer will do, declarative programming languages are an example here. The only difference I see is that special precaution should be taken to get deterministic output from AI, but that's doable.
    - charcircuit 10mo ago
      Code is defined as: >noun A system of symbols and rules used to represent instructions to a computer; a computer program. In the other hand the prompt is for the AI. It's not meant for instructions to a computer.
      - matrss 10mo ago
        So, Prolog is not code then? > Except you can't run english on your computer. I can't run C on it either, without translating it to machine code first. Is C code?
        charcircuit 10mo ago
        A prompt is for the AI to follow. C is for the computer to follow. I don't want to play games with definitions anymore, so I am no longer going to reply if you continue to drill down and nitpick about exact definitions.
        defrost 10mo ago
        > the prompt is for the AI. and C is for the compiler not "the computer". It's commonplace for a compiler on one computer to read C code created on a second computer and output (if successfully parsed) machine code for a third computer.
        matrss 10mo ago
        If you don't want to argue about definitions, then I'd recommend you don't start arguments about definitions. "AI" is not special-sauce. LLMs are transformations that map an input (a prompt) to some output (in this case the implementation of a specification used as a prompt). Likewise, a C compiler is a transformation that maps an input (C code) to some output (an executable program). Currently the big difference between the two is that LLMs are usually probabilistic and non-deterministic. Their output for the same prompt can change wildly in-between invocations. C compilers on the other hand usually have the property that their output is deterministic, or at least functionally equivalent for independent invocation with the same input. This might be the most important property that a compiler has to have, together with "the generated program does what the code told it to do". Now, if multiple invocations of a LLM were to reliably produce functionally equivalent implementations of a specification as long as the specification doesn't change (and assuming that this generated implementation does actually implement the specification), then how does the LLM differ from a compiler? If it does not fundamentally differ from a compiler, then why should the specification not be called code?
alphabetag675 10mo ago
As long as your language is good enough to generate correct code at any point, it is a specification. If not, it is an ambiguous approximation.
- deleted 10mo ago
  [deleted]
chmod775 10mo ago
You can't run most of what you would probably consider "code" on your computer either. C, Python, Rust, ... all have to be translated into something your computer can execute by compilers and interpreters. On the other hand no current LLM can implement complex software from specification alone, especially not without iterating. Just today I realized how laughable far we are, after having fought GPT-5.1-Codex-Max for way longer than I should have over correctly implementing a 400 line python script for wrangling some git repositories. These things are infuriatingly bad as soon as you move away from things like web development.

free_bip 10mo ago

What do you mean? I can run English on my computer. There are multiple apps out there that will let me type "delete all files starting with" hacker"" into the terminal and end up with the correct end result. And before you say "that's indirect!", it genuinely does not matter how indirect the execution is or how many "translation layers" there are. Python for example goes through at least 3 translation layers, raw .py -> Python bytecode -> bytecode interpreter -> machine code. Adding one more automated translation layer does not suddenly make it "not code."

charcircuit 10mo ago
I mean that the prompt is not like code. It's not a set of instructions that encodes what the computer will do. It includes instructions for how an AI can create the necessary code. Just because a specification is "translated" into code, that doesn't mean the input is necessarily code.
- yaris 10mo ago
  What is conceptually different between prompts and code? Code is also not always what the computer will do, declarative programming languages are an example here. The only difference I see is that special precaution should be taken to get deterministic output from AI, but that's doable.
  - charcircuit 10mo ago
    Code is defined as: >noun A system of symbols and rules used to represent instructions to a computer; a computer program. In the other hand the prompt is for the AI. It's not meant for instructions to a computer.
    - matrss 10mo ago
      So, Prolog is not code then? > Except you can't run english on your computer. I can't run C on it either, without translating it to machine code first. Is C code?
      - charcircuit 10mo ago
        A prompt is for the AI to follow. C is for the computer to follow. I don't want to play games with definitions anymore, so I am no longer going to reply if you continue to drill down and nitpick about exact definitions.
        defrost 10mo ago
        > the prompt is for the AI. and C is for the compiler not "the computer". It's commonplace for a compiler on one computer to read C code created on a second computer and output (if successfully parsed) machine code for a third computer.
        matrss 10mo ago
        If you don't want to argue about definitions, then I'd recommend you don't start arguments about definitions. "AI" is not special-sauce. LLMs are transformations that map an input (a prompt) to some output (in this case the implementation of a specification used as a prompt). Likewise, a C compiler is a transformation that maps an input (C code) to some output (an executable program). Currently the big difference between the two is that LLMs are usually probabilistic and non-deterministic. Their output for the same prompt can change wildly in-between invocations. C compilers on the other hand usually have the property that their output is deterministic, or at least functionally equivalent for independent invocation with the same input. This might be the most important property that a compiler has to have, together with "the generated program does what the code told it to do". Now, if multiple invocations of a LLM were to reliably produce functionally equivalent implementations of a specification as long as the specification doesn't change (and assuming that this generated implementation does actually implement the specification), then how does the LLM differ from a compiler? If it does not fundamentally differ from a compiler, then why should the specification not be called code?

alphabetag675 10mo ago

As long as your language is good enough to generate correct code at any point, it is a specification. If not, it is an ambiguous approximation.

deleted 10mo ago
[deleted]

chmod775 10mo ago

You can't run most of what you would probably consider "code" on your computer either. C, Python, Rust, ... all have to be translated into something your computer can execute by compilers and interpreters. On the other hand no current LLM can implement complex software from specification alone, especially not without iterating. Just today I realized how laughable far we are, after having fought GPT-5.1-Codex-Max for way longer than I should have over correctly implementing a 400 line python script for wrangling some git repositories. These things are infuriatingly bad as soon as you move away from things like web development.