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I'm bearish on AI creating working software but bullish on AI doing this kind of thing
by bandrami 9mo ago
I'm bearish on AI creating working software but bullish on AI doing this kind of thing
- cryptonector 9mo agoAI is definitely creating working software. It's also leading people to submit hallucinations as security vulns in open source. I've had to deal with some of them.
- bandrami 9mo agoNah, if that were true there would be a lot more new software available. What's it working at is making developers feel busy, which is itself a worthwhile task.
- dboreham 9mo agoThere may be some other limiting factors on the rate of generation of new useful software. E.g. money to market it, humans to specify it, perhaps there's enough software already...
- bandrami 9mo agoIf there's enough software already than LLMs are the worst-timed invention in human history...
- rascul 9mo agoMaybe it's available but you don't realize it.
- bandrami 9mo agoMaybe. Sounds like a real marketing failure in that case
- lmm 9mo agoDefine "working". It's creating software that does what someone wanted some of the time, sure.
- soulofmischief 9mo agoAre you unable to create working software with frontier models?
- bandrami 9mo agoI am, though it always takes me longer than just writing it myself because I have to fix so much (which may be a function of the kind of software I write). But more importantly the development team I support as an admin absolutely loves their agents or whatever they're being called this week and yet isn't giving me stuff that I can move into operations any faster than they were a year ago.
- soulofmischief 9mo agoWhat industry, and what kind of software? Your assessment was generally spot on a year ago, but things have changed dramatically in the last quarter, so I'm curious how fresh this assessment is.
- bandrami 9mo agoWell, multiple types of software. The avionics simulation software we make isn't really a candidate for AI both because of procurement requirements and the fact that as of this month (we do check periodically) no LLM really gets how to do realtime Linux processes (this may be downstream of the fact that most writing about this topic on the Web is catastrophically wrong). The stuff we can use AI on is just generic customer-facing web schlock and it sure looks like we're trading dev time for integration time for what ends up being a wash.
- soulofmischief 9mo agoInteresting, thanks for sharing! As for the web stuff, these tools are great in the hands of thoughtful, attentive, experienced engineers who have developed the muscles for knowing how to slap these models into shape. For anyone else, I agree right now that they can be more headache than they are worth. I get a lot of velocity out of Opus 4.5 and spend 8-20 hours a day coding with it nearly every day, but I am constantly, multiple times an hour, screaming and yelling at these things, getting frustrated and bewildered by their output, etc. It is absolutely a tradeoff, but thankfully the tradeoff for me is frustration and mental energy, instead of correctness or performance. But left alone, these models drive in circles and tear everything up along the way. I totally believe you about these models having difficulty with realtime programming. It's a more niche field with less example training material. Out or pure curiosity I do wish I was able to see exactly where the failure modes arise. I wonder how things will be at the end of 2026, because 2025 was a game changer for many domains.