4 ms·

And in #27 we find the rationale behind all LLM coding agents, "Once you understand how a program works, get someone else to write it for you."

hugo0vaz 4mo ago
I think you misunderstood what the phrase actually means. You can only successfully manage or outsource a process once you understand it well enough to explain it. Therefore, most of the people doing agentic engineering are not following this Perlisim.
- dtagames 4mo ago
  Oh, that's exactly what I meant, except its corollary. People who do understand how software works should absolutely be having agents code it. And we do.
  - skydhash 4mo ago
    > People who do understand how software works should absolutely be having agents code it. I don’t think there’s such people. Either you’re writing a software for the first time and so the premise is not true. Or you’re writing it a second time and what would be the point? Just reuse the code you already have.
    - dtagames 4mo ago
      There are lots of people who understand how software works, including the fact that every line of code is new or else you wouldn't need to write it. Personally, I love "philosophy of software" questions like these, especially in the AI era. I write quite a bit about this on Medium: https://medium.com/@mimixco https://medium.com/@mimixco
      - skydhash 4mo ago
        Maybe we need a definition of “understanding how software works”. There’s the technical aspect (computation theory, computer organization, compilation, executable format, …) and there’s the necessity aspect (the domain). The technical aspect can be learned although you can stop at the top of the abstraction tower (the programming language and its ecosystem). The domain aspect encompasses the whole world pretty much. Contributing to Blender does not qualify you to review a Krita patch. You have to learn the latter’s code first.
summa_tech 4mo ago
Once you understand how a program works, get someone else to write it for you. Then, you will quickly find out your understanding was insufficient.
- dtagames 4mo ago
  Is that ever true! I wrote a whole Medium article[0] about this, one of my most popular. It's called "YOU ARE BUGS" as a joke from Three Body Problem on Netflix. [0] https://medium.com/gitconnected/you-are-bugs-improving-your-code-with-ai-agents-d6052de6633d https://medium.com/gitconnected/you-are-bugs-improving-your-...
fhars 4mo ago
The actual prescient LLM quote is "7. It is easier to write an incorrect program than understand a correct one."

hugo0vaz 4mo ago

I think you misunderstood what the phrase actually means. You can only successfully manage or outsource a process once you understand it well enough to explain it. Therefore, most of the people doing agentic engineering are not following this Perlisim.

dtagames 4mo ago
Oh, that's exactly what I meant, except its corollary. People who do understand how software works should absolutely be having agents code it. And we do.
- skydhash 4mo ago
  > People who do understand how software works should absolutely be having agents code it. I don’t think there’s such people. Either you’re writing a software for the first time and so the premise is not true. Or you’re writing it a second time and what would be the point? Just reuse the code you already have.
  - dtagames 4mo ago
    There are lots of people who understand how software works, including the fact that every line of code is new or else you wouldn't need to write it. Personally, I love "philosophy of software" questions like these, especially in the AI era. I write quite a bit about this on Medium: https://medium.com/@mimixco https://medium.com/@mimixco
    - skydhash 4mo ago
      Maybe we need a definition of “understanding how software works”. There’s the technical aspect (computation theory, computer organization, compilation, executable format, …) and there’s the necessity aspect (the domain). The technical aspect can be learned although you can stop at the top of the abstraction tower (the programming language and its ecosystem). The domain aspect encompasses the whole world pretty much. Contributing to Blender does not qualify you to review a Krita patch. You have to learn the latter’s code first.

summa_tech 4mo ago

Once you understand how a program works, get someone else to write it for you. Then, you will quickly find out your understanding was insufficient.

dtagames 4mo ago
Is that ever true! I wrote a whole Medium article[0] about this, one of my most popular. It's called "YOU ARE BUGS" as a joke from Three Body Problem on Netflix. [0] https://medium.com/gitconnected/you-are-bugs-improving-your-code-with-ai-agents-d6052de6633d https://medium.com/gitconnected/you-are-bugs-improving-your-...

fhars 4mo ago

The actual prescient LLM quote is "7. It is easier to write an incorrect program than understand a correct one."