[aiforecastthway]

I decided to go into programming instead of becoming an Engineer because most Engineering jobs seemed systematic and boring. (Software Engineers weren't really a thing at the time.)

For most of my career, Software Engineering was a misnomer. The field was too young, and the tools used changed too quickly, for an appreciable amount of the work to be systematic and boring enough to consider it an Engineering discipline.

I think we're now at the point where Software Engineering is... actually Engineering. Particularly in the case of large established companies that take software seriously, like Google (as opposed to e.g. a bank).

Call it "trivial" and "boring" all you want, but at some point a road is just a road, and a train track is just a train track, and if it's not "trivial and boring" then you've probably fucked up pretty badly.

[javaunsafe2019]

Since when is engineering boring? Stranges ideas and claims u made.

I’m an engineer who writes code since 20 years and it’s far away from trivial . Maybe to do web dev for a simple Webshop is. Elsewhere software has often times special requirements. Be them technical or domain wise both make the process complex and not simple IMHO

[aiforecastthway]

Boring is the opposite of exciting/dynamic.

Not all engineering is boring. Also, boring is not bad.

A lot of my career has been spent working to make software boring. To the extent that I've helped contribute to the status quo, where we can build certain types of software in a relatively secure fashion and on relatively predictable timelines, I am proud to have made the world more boring!

(Also, complexity can be extraordinarily boring. Some of the most complex things are also the most boring. Nothing more boring than a set of business rules that has an irreducible complexity coming in at 5,211 lines of if-else blocks wrapped in two while loops! Give me a simple set of partial differential equations any day -- much more exciting to work with those! If you're the type of person who enjoys reading tax code, then we just have different definitions of boring; and if you're the type of person doesn't think tax code is complex, then I'm just a dummy compared to you :))

But e.g. in the early naughts doing structural engineering work for residential new build projects was certainly less engaging and exciting work than building websites.

Most engineering works aims for repeatable and predictable outcomes. That's a good thing, and it's not easy to achieve! But if Software has reached the point where the process of building certain types of software is "repeatable and predictable", and if Google needs a lot of that type of software, then if the main criticism of AI code assistants is "it's only good for repeatable and predictable", well, then the criticism isn't exactly the indictment that skeptics think it is.

There is nothing wrong with boring in the sense I'm using it. Boring can be tremendously intellectually demanding. Also, predictable and repeatable processes are incredibly important if you want quality work at scale. Engineering is a good thing. Maturing as a field is a good thing.

But if we're maturing from "wild west everything is a greenfield project" to "70% of things are pretty systematic and repeatable" then that says something about the criticism of AI coding assistants as being only good for the systematic and repeatable stuff, right?

Also: the AI coding assistant paradigm is coming for structural/mechanical/civil engineering next, and in a big way!

[sally_glance]

I was totally with you until "70% of things are pretty systematic and repeatable". This has not been my experience, and I think you acknowledged it yourself when you said "Google (as opposed to e.g. a bank)" - there are many more banks in the world than Googles. The main challenge will be transitioning all those "banks" to "Google's" and further still. They have 10y+ codebases written in 5 months by a single genius engineer (who later found his luck elsewhere), then hammered by multiple years of changing maintainers. That's the real "70% of things" :D

[aiforecastthway]

No, I think we agree! Google SWE roles will be automated faster SWE roles in the financial sector :)