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This is really not true. There are stories of people who had no background in software engineering who now write entire applications using AI. And I have person

by amelius 8mo ago

This is really not true. There are stories of people who had no background in software engineering who now write entire applications using AI. And I have personally seen this happen.

pojzon 8mo ago
Its silly to say this but one such person is „pewdiepie”
mikkupikku 8mo ago
Smart people can hit the ground running if they're freed from the need to first learn the intricacies of a new language. We're going to see an explosion in the number of people writing software as clever people who invested their time in something other than learning to program are now able to write software for themselves.
switchbak 8mo ago
What is not true, that "so many software engineers are having an identity crisis"? I don't believe they said that folks new to AI can't make impressive use of it. They did however say that senior folks with lots of scrappy and holistic knowledge can do amazing things with it. Both can be true.
strken 8mo ago
Before AI, there were also stories of people who had no background in software engineering who wrote entire applications using their fingers. This was called "learning to be a software engineer". I don't mean to snipe at AI, because it really does seem to have set more people on the path of learning, but I was writing VB5 apps when I was 14 by copying poorly understood bits and pieces from books. Now people are doing basically the same but with less typing and everyone thinks it's a revolution.
- anon-3988 8mo ago
  I have never seen people learn how to be a software engineer in a weekend tho.
  - pamcake 8mo ago
    And neither do you today. There is more to it than "being able to make an entire application", which a novice could also have pulled off in a weekend 10 years ago.
- munksbeer 8mo ago
  Learning to code and write an application was very hard for most people, because of time and other friction. I know of non-coders who now have applications running for various things they find useful. You might not consider this productive, but they do, so what you think literally doesn't matter to them.
leptons 8mo ago
I've seen people generate a lot of vibeslop with AI, but they didn't actually "Write entire applications using AI". They still have absolutely no clue how it works, so how could they "write entire applications"? They vibed it, but they certainly didn't write any of it, not one bit of it, and they're clueless as to how to extend it, upgrade it, and maintain it so that the AI doesn't make it a bloated monstrosity of AI patches and fixes and workarounds that they simply could never begin to understand. They were also following a dozen youtube tutorials step by step, so even that part was someone else doing the thinking. Yeah, these are the same guys constantly bugging me to help them figure something out.
- timacles 8mo ago
  Yeah no way are people developing actual applications. They’re developing one off apps, tools and websites. The amount of robustness a usable application with actual purpose requires is exactly where LLMs fall apart. I’m not a naysayer by any means and at this point use Llms all day for many purpose. But it is undeniable that the exact moment complexity reaches a certain threshold, LLMs need more and more guidance and specific implementation details to make worthwhile improvements. This same complexity threshold is where real world functionality lives.
abustamam 8mo ago
This may be true, but define an entire application. Is it a CRUD app? Is it an app that scales to a thousand, ten thousand, a million users? Is it an app that is bug free and if not bug free, easy to fix said bugs with few to no regressions? Is it an app that is easy to maintain and add new features to without risk of breaking other stuff? I think it is genuinely impressive to be able to build one app with AI. But I haven't seen evidence that someone could build a maintanable, scalable app with ai. In fact, anecdotally, a friend of mine who runs an agency had a client who vibe coded their app, figured out that they couldn't maintain it, and had him rewrite the app in a way that could be maintained long term. Again, I'm not an Ai detractor. I use it every day at work. But I've needed to harden my app and rules and such, such that the AI cannot make mistakes when I or another engineer is vibing a new feature. It's a work in progress.

by amelius 8mo ago

This is really not true. There are stories of people who had no background in software engineering who now write entire applications using AI. And I have personally seen this happen.

pojzon 8mo ago

Its silly to say this but one such person is „pewdiepie”

mikkupikku 8mo ago

Smart people can hit the ground running if they're freed from the need to first learn the intricacies of a new language. We're going to see an explosion in the number of people writing software as clever people who invested their time in something other than learning to program are now able to write software for themselves.

switchbak 8mo ago

What is not true, that "so many software engineers are having an identity crisis"? I don't believe they said that folks new to AI can't make impressive use of it. They did however say that senior folks with lots of scrappy and holistic knowledge can do amazing things with it. Both can be true.

strken 8mo ago

Before AI, there were also stories of people who had no background in software engineering who wrote entire applications using their fingers. This was called "learning to be a software engineer". I don't mean to snipe at AI, because it really does seem to have set more people on the path of learning, but I was writing VB5 apps when I was 14 by copying poorly understood bits and pieces from books. Now people are doing basically the same but with less typing and everyone thinks it's a revolution.

anon-3988 8mo ago
I have never seen people learn how to be a software engineer in a weekend tho.
- pamcake 8mo ago
  And neither do you today. There is more to it than "being able to make an entire application", which a novice could also have pulled off in a weekend 10 years ago.
munksbeer 8mo ago
Learning to code and write an application was very hard for most people, because of time and other friction. I know of non-coders who now have applications running for various things they find useful. You might not consider this productive, but they do, so what you think literally doesn't matter to them.

leptons 8mo ago

I've seen people generate a lot of vibeslop with AI, but they didn't actually "Write entire applications using AI". They still have absolutely no clue how it works, so how could they "write entire applications"? They vibed it, but they certainly didn't write any of it, not one bit of it, and they're clueless as to how to extend it, upgrade it, and maintain it so that the AI doesn't make it a bloated monstrosity of AI patches and fixes and workarounds that they simply could never begin to understand. They were also following a dozen youtube tutorials step by step, so even that part was someone else doing the thinking. Yeah, these are the same guys constantly bugging me to help them figure something out.

timacles 8mo ago
Yeah no way are people developing actual applications. They’re developing one off apps, tools and websites. The amount of robustness a usable application with actual purpose requires is exactly where LLMs fall apart. I’m not a naysayer by any means and at this point use Llms all day for many purpose. But it is undeniable that the exact moment complexity reaches a certain threshold, LLMs need more and more guidance and specific implementation details to make worthwhile improvements. This same complexity threshold is where real world functionality lives.

abustamam 8mo ago

This may be true, but define an entire application. Is it a CRUD app? Is it an app that scales to a thousand, ten thousand, a million users? Is it an app that is bug free and if not bug free, easy to fix said bugs with few to no regressions? Is it an app that is easy to maintain and add new features to without risk of breaking other stuff? I think it is genuinely impressive to be able to build one app with AI. But I haven't seen evidence that someone could build a maintanable, scalable app with ai. In fact, anecdotally, a friend of mine who runs an agency had a client who vibe coded their app, figured out that they couldn't maintain it, and had him rewrite the app in a way that could be maintained long term. Again, I'm not an Ai detractor. I use it every day at work. But I've needed to harden my app and rules and such, such that the AI cannot make mistakes when I or another engineer is vibing a new feature. It's a work in progress.