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by silisili 405 days ago
I was playing with a toy program trying to hyperoptimize it and asked for suggestions. ChatGPT confidently gave me a few, with reasoning for each.

Great. Implement it, benchmark, slower. In some cases much slower. I tell ChatGPT it's slower, and it confidently tells me of course it's slower, here's why.

The duality of LLMs, I guess.
2 comments
insane_dreamer 405 days ago
This has happened too many times:

- me: how can I do X?

- llm: do this

- me: doesn't fully work

- llm: refactoring to make it more robust ...

- me: still doesn't fully work

- llm: refactoring ...

- me: now it's worse than before

- llm: refactoring ...

- me: better but now there's this other regression

- llm: refactoring ...

- me: we're back to the first issue again

- (eventually ... me: forget it, I could have done it myself by now)

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silisili 405 days ago
Oh man. That reminds me of a recent thing I've been testing with deepseek and gemini via roo/cline.

I pretty much only use them for mundane tasks, like 'heres 12 json files, add this field to each.' Boring right?

They are both so slow. They 'think' way too much before every single edit. Gemini is a little faster to start but 429s repeatedly so ends up being slower. It also would reorder some keys in the json for no apparent reason, but who cares.

In the end, I realize I could have probably done it myself in 1/3 the time it took those.

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thechao 405 days ago
Me: What is the tallest tree in Texas?

CGT: The tallest tree in Texas is a 44 foot tall tree in ...

Me: No it's not! The tallest tree is a pine in East Texas!

CGT: You're right! The tallest tree in Texas is probably a Loblolly Pine in East Texas; they grow to a height of 100–150', but some have been recorded to be 180' or more.

Me: That's not right! In 1890 a group of Californians moved to Houston and planted a Sequoia, it's been growing there since then, and is nearly 300 feet tall.

CGT: Yes, correct. In the late 19th century, many Sequoia Sempervirens were planted in and around Houston.

...

I mean, come on; I already spew enough bullshit, I don't need an automated friend to help out!

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