3 ms·

I’m not a developer, but when I watch devs whose work process is prompt, copy-paste, try to run, paste error into code, try to run, etc. I can’t help but think

I’m not a developer, but when I watch devs whose work process is prompt, copy-paste, try to run, paste error into code, try to run, etc. I can’t help but think they’re unskilled. There’s no brain engagement, no understanding of the bigger picture, just being a worse slower agent.

jvanderbot 3mo ago
Sure, but even worse, is the state-of-the-art: they use a cli agent and the "copy-paste, try to run, paste error, try to run" loop is called "Agentic engineering." Now we have to believe they're 10/10? I see no difference there except speed at the cost of whatever little understanding may have been gained by the manual inspection between steps.
- deleted 3mo ago
  [deleted]
- derrida 3mo ago
  while 0: x=ctrl-c("output error report") eval(ctrl-v(x)) sleep(10) user("Input...") something like this?
- kooi 3mo ago
  Any competent developer knows there are limits to prompting. Personally I've found LLM's suck at multi-threaded applications. (Because I've been tempted by the ~agentic loop~ and been burned. Then I hand code the core logic and all is well). Woe to the developer who tries to prompt their way through this.
  - wuliwong 3mo ago
    I hit a wall with creating a browser based video editor. Up until then, over the last year, I have been taking my hands off the wheel more and more and really have just become more and more productive. This video editor experience has forced me to get more into the code again.
  - abustamam 3mo ago
    Skill issue /s But seriously, lots of apps are just glorified NextJS apps which have tons of training data. Something like rust would likely churn out nonsense that compiles eventually but isn't optimal.
    - kooi 3mo ago
      sKiLl IsSuE - some redditor XD Agreed with the caveat that I think if you know what you're doing and are very cognizant, LLM generated Rust is amazing. I feel like it's hard compilation requirements gives a guardrails for a LLM and if it compiles, you're pretty safe against memory issues.
  - zumtrotz 3mo ago
    They suck at multi-threading, they suck at maintaining a coherent goal through multiple files, they suck at basic math (claude could NOT figure out how to get the hypotenuse of a triangle given angle and side lengths...). Sometimes I mess around with prompts just to see what I get back, more often than not, it's mostly a waste of time. God forbid you use it to refactor anything.
- mattgreenrocks 3mo ago
  The industry has always found it strangely taboo to actually talk about the wide variance in developer skill.
  - iwontberude 3mo ago
    True because we have pay bands that everyone has to somehow be hired for and fit within.
  - spencerflem 3mo ago
    Is it? I hear about 10xers all the time
tdeck 3mo ago
This is my exact process nowadays when debugging some weird Linux wifi driver issue or something that came up after upgrade. But that's because I don't have any real familiarity with the systems involved and I don't expect that gaining such familiarity will benefit me. If I am working on a system or product I'm responsible for at my job, it should be a different situation.
tomtomtom777 3mo ago
I think the worst is when they are skilled. You're basically describing my work day. My job went from interesting, highly skilled work to mostly horrible brain rot over the past year. It's depressing and I don't know a way out. Other then a complete career change, throwing away 30 years of experience and a matching salary.
- pixl97 3mo ago
  I mean, we're just the neo-luddites in this case. Or maybe the rust belt when jobs moved elsewhere. The real question isn't if things are going to change around our jobs, its are we going to be able to move fast enough to avoid starving in the streets?
  - seanw444 3mo ago
    Yeah, the economy wants a dystopia, so we're just gonna have to let that happen industry by industry, calling each group that is exploited for maximal corporate gain a neo-luddite. Inevitability and whatnot. Hell, we're gonna die one day anyway, that's also inevitable, so we might as well all just drink the Kool-Aid too.
    - inigyou 3mo ago
      there are two things that people do to affect large scale society: things that don't work, and things that are illegal.
- leptons 3mo ago
  I'm in the same boat as you... 30 years of experience writing software, and now I'm just supposed to click "approve" on PRs without reading the PR. I'm just supposed to press a button. I'm looking for a new job, but it's going to be difficult to find one in tech that isn't a complete AI-psychosis shitshow.
  - icedchai 3mo ago
    Same. I'm being forced into a position where I'm supposed to do everything with AI agents, not write any manual code, and only act as a reviewer. It sounds like you know the drill. It may push me into early retirement.
mikebenfield 3mo ago
I think I’m pretty skilled, or at least I was, but much of my work now looks like this. The fact is in many cases Claude can diagnose and fix the issue quicker than I can even read it. It would be crazy not to take advantage of this. Of course it does get hard to resist the temptation to just become ever lazier over time.
- seanw444 3mo ago
  It fixes it at face value, for now. The long-term effects of corporate nearsightedness might be too great to absorb this time around.
projectazorian 3mo ago
This is a sign of poor harness configuration and/or org level constraints (lack of MCP support, etc.) With properly configured and prompted agents error copy-pasta should be the exception not the norm.
aucisson_masque 3mo ago
I'm not a dev and that's exactly what I do but I also have absolutely no skill in coding, and am not paid... People doing that will be replaced, in best case scenario, by cheap labor, and worst case by computers.

jvanderbot 3mo ago

Sure, but even worse, is the state-of-the-art: they use a cli agent and the "copy-paste, try to run, paste error, try to run" loop is called "Agentic engineering." Now we have to believe they're 10/10? I see no difference there except speed at the cost of whatever little understanding may have been gained by the manual inspection between steps.

deleted 3mo ago
[deleted]
derrida 3mo ago
while 0: x=ctrl-c("output error report") eval(ctrl-v(x)) sleep(10) user("Input...") something like this?
kooi 3mo ago
Any competent developer knows there are limits to prompting. Personally I've found LLM's suck at multi-threaded applications. (Because I've been tempted by the ~agentic loop~ and been burned. Then I hand code the core logic and all is well). Woe to the developer who tries to prompt their way through this.
- wuliwong 3mo ago
  I hit a wall with creating a browser based video editor. Up until then, over the last year, I have been taking my hands off the wheel more and more and really have just become more and more productive. This video editor experience has forced me to get more into the code again.
- abustamam 3mo ago
  Skill issue /s But seriously, lots of apps are just glorified NextJS apps which have tons of training data. Something like rust would likely churn out nonsense that compiles eventually but isn't optimal.
  - kooi 3mo ago
    sKiLl IsSuE - some redditor XD Agreed with the caveat that I think if you know what you're doing and are very cognizant, LLM generated Rust is amazing. I feel like it's hard compilation requirements gives a guardrails for a LLM and if it compiles, you're pretty safe against memory issues.
- zumtrotz 3mo ago
  They suck at multi-threading, they suck at maintaining a coherent goal through multiple files, they suck at basic math (claude could NOT figure out how to get the hypotenuse of a triangle given angle and side lengths...). Sometimes I mess around with prompts just to see what I get back, more often than not, it's mostly a waste of time. God forbid you use it to refactor anything.
mattgreenrocks 3mo ago
The industry has always found it strangely taboo to actually talk about the wide variance in developer skill.
- iwontberude 3mo ago
  True because we have pay bands that everyone has to somehow be hired for and fit within.
- spencerflem 3mo ago
  Is it? I hear about 10xers all the time

tdeck 3mo ago

This is my exact process nowadays when debugging some weird Linux wifi driver issue or something that came up after upgrade. But that's because I don't have any real familiarity with the systems involved and I don't expect that gaining such familiarity will benefit me. If I am working on a system or product I'm responsible for at my job, it should be a different situation.

tomtomtom777 3mo ago

I think the worst is when they are skilled. You're basically describing my work day. My job went from interesting, highly skilled work to mostly horrible brain rot over the past year. It's depressing and I don't know a way out. Other then a complete career change, throwing away 30 years of experience and a matching salary.

pixl97 3mo ago
I mean, we're just the neo-luddites in this case. Or maybe the rust belt when jobs moved elsewhere. The real question isn't if things are going to change around our jobs, its are we going to be able to move fast enough to avoid starving in the streets?
- seanw444 3mo ago
  Yeah, the economy wants a dystopia, so we're just gonna have to let that happen industry by industry, calling each group that is exploited for maximal corporate gain a neo-luddite. Inevitability and whatnot. Hell, we're gonna die one day anyway, that's also inevitable, so we might as well all just drink the Kool-Aid too.
  - inigyou 3mo ago
    there are two things that people do to affect large scale society: things that don't work, and things that are illegal.
leptons 3mo ago
I'm in the same boat as you... 30 years of experience writing software, and now I'm just supposed to click "approve" on PRs without reading the PR. I'm just supposed to press a button. I'm looking for a new job, but it's going to be difficult to find one in tech that isn't a complete AI-psychosis shitshow.
- icedchai 3mo ago
  Same. I'm being forced into a position where I'm supposed to do everything with AI agents, not write any manual code, and only act as a reviewer. It sounds like you know the drill. It may push me into early retirement.

mikebenfield 3mo ago

I think I’m pretty skilled, or at least I was, but much of my work now looks like this. The fact is in many cases Claude can diagnose and fix the issue quicker than I can even read it. It would be crazy not to take advantage of this. Of course it does get hard to resist the temptation to just become ever lazier over time.

seanw444 3mo ago
It fixes it at face value, for now. The long-term effects of corporate nearsightedness might be too great to absorb this time around.

projectazorian 3mo ago

This is a sign of poor harness configuration and/or org level constraints (lack of MCP support, etc.) With properly configured and prompted agents error copy-pasta should be the exception not the norm.

aucisson_masque 3mo ago

I'm not a dev and that's exactly what I do but I also have absolutely no skill in coding, and am not paid... People doing that will be replaced, in best case scenario, by cheap labor, and worst case by computers.