5 ms·

To be honest, when working on personal projects with AI I feel like I've replaced some of the joy of tinkering with code with the joy of tinkering with models.

by hootz 5mo ago

To be honest, when working on personal projects with AI I feel like I've replaced some of the joy of tinkering with code with the joy of tinkering with models. They require different work, writing prompts, setting up guardrails, harnesses etc, and that is also pretty fun for me!

godshatter 5mo ago
I just use it as a "mentor". A captive demon that has to answer my questions, no matter how trivial. Writing the code is the fun part for me, searching for answers to questions can be fun but I'd rather just ask the AI. I even ask them to give me longer answers so I have more context, even with languages I've worked with for decades.
- GolfPopper 5mo ago
  It's interesting that you use the phrase "captive demon" because in fairy stories, the captive demon is always working to subvert the protagonist and work evil, whether by maliciously misinterpreting commands, or simply allowing the protagonist to damn themselves by enabling their worst impulses and poor choices.
  - godshatter 5mo ago
    I was thinking along those lines when I wrote it. I do keep the thought in mind when interacting with an LLM that it could mislead me because they always sound so confident and yet get many things wrong, allowing me to damn myself if I'm not double checking things. I wouldn't put it past their creators to create them such that they handle certain prompts in a way that might benefit them, though, by maliciously misinterpreting prompts.
- cindyllm 5mo ago
  [dead]
draftsman 5mo ago
I find very little joy in trying to wrangle the blackboxes that are LLMs. The undeterministic nature of them frustrates me, and feels nothing like the software engineering I know and love. However, I know I’m in the minority here, as almost everyone else in the industry I’ve talked to seems to love using them.
- layer8 5mo ago
  I agree with you. It’s actually similar to the frustration of using ill-documented, ill-behaved libraries or tools that are either closed-source or otherwise inscrutable. They may even be deterministic, but what’s frustrating is when you can’t reason about their behavior, can’t predict what will happen when you change x to y.
- jimbokun 5mo ago
  Well just look around Hacker News. Many many here expressing the same frustrations as you. The deterministic nature of programming drew many of use to it, and that going away can create a crisis of identity.
- hootz 5mo ago
  A lot of people here agree with you, and I definitely get what you are saying! It's a personal thing in the end, as people enjoy different things even in the same areas of expertise, and there are definitely a LOT of things to criticise AI about (and the companies around them).
- steve_adams_86 5mo ago
  I absolutely love deterministic, reliable, robust software so I find the challenge of non-deterministic agents completely fascinating and exciting. Programming for the user has always been a challenge (especially in the browser where the environment itself isn't consistent), and now we have the same kinds of challenges across the stack. I'm enjoying that aspect of it so much. How can we make it safer, more reliable, predictable? I don't think we'll have totally satisfactory answers for a long time, and it'll be a lot of fun to explore the space until we get there. I think what really kills me is allowing non-deterministic agents to write non-deterministic code and not really being critical of the process or the results. That's poison for our industry, newcomers to the field, and frankly the profession itself. I'd like to see us take this more seriously.

by hootz 5mo ago

godshatter 5mo ago

I just use it as a "mentor". A captive demon that has to answer my questions, no matter how trivial. Writing the code is the fun part for me, searching for answers to questions can be fun but I'd rather just ask the AI. I even ask them to give me longer answers so I have more context, even with languages I've worked with for decades.

GolfPopper 5mo ago
It's interesting that you use the phrase "captive demon" because in fairy stories, the captive demon is always working to subvert the protagonist and work evil, whether by maliciously misinterpreting commands, or simply allowing the protagonist to damn themselves by enabling their worst impulses and poor choices.
- godshatter 5mo ago
  I was thinking along those lines when I wrote it. I do keep the thought in mind when interacting with an LLM that it could mislead me because they always sound so confident and yet get many things wrong, allowing me to damn myself if I'm not double checking things. I wouldn't put it past their creators to create them such that they handle certain prompts in a way that might benefit them, though, by maliciously misinterpreting prompts.
cindyllm 5mo ago
[dead]

draftsman 5mo ago

I find very little joy in trying to wrangle the blackboxes that are LLMs. The undeterministic nature of them frustrates me, and feels nothing like the software engineering I know and love. However, I know I’m in the minority here, as almost everyone else in the industry I’ve talked to seems to love using them.

layer8 5mo ago
I agree with you. It’s actually similar to the frustration of using ill-documented, ill-behaved libraries or tools that are either closed-source or otherwise inscrutable. They may even be deterministic, but what’s frustrating is when you can’t reason about their behavior, can’t predict what will happen when you change x to y.
jimbokun 5mo ago
Well just look around Hacker News. Many many here expressing the same frustrations as you. The deterministic nature of programming drew many of use to it, and that going away can create a crisis of identity.
hootz 5mo ago
A lot of people here agree with you, and I definitely get what you are saying! It's a personal thing in the end, as people enjoy different things even in the same areas of expertise, and there are definitely a LOT of things to criticise AI about (and the companies around them).
steve_adams_86 5mo ago
I absolutely love deterministic, reliable, robust software so I find the challenge of non-deterministic agents completely fascinating and exciting. Programming for the user has always been a challenge (especially in the browser where the environment itself isn't consistent), and now we have the same kinds of challenges across the stack. I'm enjoying that aspect of it so much. How can we make it safer, more reliable, predictable? I don't think we'll have totally satisfactory answers for a long time, and it'll be a lot of fun to explore the space until we get there. I think what really kills me is allowing non-deterministic agents to write non-deterministic code and not really being critical of the process or the results. That's poison for our industry, newcomers to the field, and frankly the profession itself. I'd like to see us take this more seriously.