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I got started as a software engineer working in the nuclear industry in the 80s. We measured our documentation in inches not pages, and it was all written by ha

I got started as a software engineer working in the nuclear industry in the 80s. We measured our documentation in inches not pages, and it was all written by hand. And I'll bet you the documentation in the nuclear industry is still written by hand and not by LLMs.

champagnepapi 2mo ago
I sure hope those docs aren’t written by LLMs for many reasons!
- andrekandre 2mo ago
  i wonder if people who use llm's for business critical documentation would have the same opinion, and if so why?
  - piloto_ciego 2mo ago
    I have used LLMs for safety sensitive tech writing and so have people I know. It’s pretty good at it, and you usually have a 95% ready to go product at the end of it. The last 5% can pretty easily be filled in by technical experts with way less time spent battling the type writer. Is it perfect? No. But it suffices most of the time in a pinch. Can’t speak to the nuke industry, but it’s pretty good at aviation related things.
    - intrasight 2mo ago
      A good compromise would be to have the LLM write the outline. That also helps get over the activation energy of starting. Then elaborate in small chunks so the human domain expert can remain focused during review.
      - piloto_ciego 2mo ago
        You don’t even really need to do that… You tell it what you need, and it pretty much does all the work: > please give me a 135 compliant maintenance manual, use the attached document as a primer, reference every part 135, 91, 43, and 65 reg as appropriate as well as the other included manuals. Make sure to reference every requirement in the attached list of requirements. Aircraft mx manuals are in the folder “mx-manuals” and our current forms are pdfs in the “forms” folder. Remember our operation is <describe scope of operation here>, not a major airline. Have fun! This does surprisingly well and meets requirements at about 95% or better accuracy. Typically the only problem I routinely is trying to make the manual like a Delta Air Lines manual instead of one for a small air taxi.

champagnepapi 2mo ago

I sure hope those docs aren’t written by LLMs for many reasons!

andrekandre 2mo ago
i wonder if people who use llm's for business critical documentation would have the same opinion, and if so why?
- piloto_ciego 2mo ago
  I have used LLMs for safety sensitive tech writing and so have people I know. It’s pretty good at it, and you usually have a 95% ready to go product at the end of it. The last 5% can pretty easily be filled in by technical experts with way less time spent battling the type writer. Is it perfect? No. But it suffices most of the time in a pinch. Can’t speak to the nuke industry, but it’s pretty good at aviation related things.
  - intrasight 2mo ago
    A good compromise would be to have the LLM write the outline. That also helps get over the activation energy of starting. Then elaborate in small chunks so the human domain expert can remain focused during review.
    - piloto_ciego 2mo ago
      You don’t even really need to do that… You tell it what you need, and it pretty much does all the work: > please give me a 135 compliant maintenance manual, use the attached document as a primer, reference every part 135, 91, 43, and 65 reg as appropriate as well as the other included manuals. Make sure to reference every requirement in the attached list of requirements. Aircraft mx manuals are in the folder “mx-manuals” and our current forms are pdfs in the “forms” folder. Remember our operation is <describe scope of operation here>, not a major airline. Have fun! This does surprisingly well and meets requirements at about 95% or better accuracy. Typically the only problem I routinely is trying to make the manual like a Delta Air Lines manual instead of one for a small air taxi.