2 ms·

My guess is that SaaS will be around, but it's going to look really different. Say there's a company that sells you a subscription to an issue tracker. At firs

My guess is that SaaS will be around, but it's going to look really different. Say there's a company that sells you a subscription to an issue tracker. At first, it looks just like any other web-based issue tracker. But, although you won't realize it at first, it's hosted on a Linux VM with a development environment on it. Each customer's app gets built from source. Then, when you want something changed, you send a message to support. And they just bounce it to a coding agent that edits the source code and rebuilds it. The sort of customization that enterprises used to pay big bucks for is going to get dramatically cheaper. (There are technical issues making this safe, but I think they'll be solved.)

sausagefeet 3mo ago
Maybe I'm a luddite, but this seems far fetched, to me. I just don't see a path for LLMs to make all kinds of changes to a codebase from non-technical people, correctly. Yes, LLMs can do amazing things, but they still don't have a mental model of what a thing is doing and make all sorts of weird decisions that are not what you want. I believe LLMs are going to make the bar for a SaaS you would pay for, as a company, higher.
- skybrian 3mo ago
  That's why I assume it goes through support. A support person checks if the prompt is reasonable (and maybe rewrites it).
  - sausagefeet 3mo ago
    Again, I just don't think that is possible. If you have, even, 100 customers, you're going to have 100 unique code bases? How can a human tell if a prompt is reasonable for a particular codebase? And who is going to train those support people? Who is going to ensure they are adding tests that actually test real and correct things?
olibhel 3mo ago
Now where's my customized toaster?
lenkite 3mo ago
Why send a message to support ? Expose the prompt to your customer if all they are doing is just bouncing it.
- skybrian 3mo ago
  I’m assuming the company has policies about what changes they can support. If that’s not true then it’s more of a hosting service.

sausagefeet 3mo ago

Maybe I'm a luddite, but this seems far fetched, to me. I just don't see a path for LLMs to make all kinds of changes to a codebase from non-technical people, correctly. Yes, LLMs can do amazing things, but they still don't have a mental model of what a thing is doing and make all sorts of weird decisions that are not what you want. I believe LLMs are going to make the bar for a SaaS you would pay for, as a company, higher.

skybrian 3mo ago
That's why I assume it goes through support. A support person checks if the prompt is reasonable (and maybe rewrites it).
- sausagefeet 3mo ago
  Again, I just don't think that is possible. If you have, even, 100 customers, you're going to have 100 unique code bases? How can a human tell if a prompt is reasonable for a particular codebase? And who is going to train those support people? Who is going to ensure they are adding tests that actually test real and correct things?

olibhel 3mo ago

Now where's my customized toaster?

lenkite 3mo ago

Why send a message to support ? Expose the prompt to your customer if all they are doing is just bouncing it.

skybrian 3mo ago
I’m assuming the company has policies about what changes they can support. If that’s not true then it’s more of a hosting service.