[varjag]

Carpenters would have cried if all their work was reduced to shoving the logs into CNC machines.

Yes there is still human input but it requires comparatively no skill or depth and it gets easier by the month. If I were lobotimized today I'd still be able to function as half-assed architect to AIs anyway.

When was the last time you read fighting distractions/getting "in the zone"/complaint about open space offices thread or comment? They used to be a weekly feature on HN frontpage.

[embedding-shape]

> Yes there is still human input but it requires comparatively no skill or depth and it gets easier by the month. If I were lobotimized today I'd still be able to function as half-assed architect to AIs anyway.

Hard doubt, software engineering is so much more than just literal coding and typing. At least for many of us, the coding/typing part is the easy stuff, everything around that is where the actual engineering happens. If I were lobotomized, maybe I'd get ~10% done today as the day before, if I'm lucky. Even with my full mental capabilities, the agents end up on wild goose-chases unless I'm very specific with what I want, and even sometimes ignoring things if they're too complicated/takes too long, so a bit of thinking is still required to get the right prompts.

And considering how subjective programming is, since it's a creative endeavour after all, I'm not that worried somehow all programmers will be unemployed in just some years.

> When was the last time

Frequency of something doesn't tell you how big of an issue something is, for all we know, HN community (or even the moderators) could have been tired of all the circular conversations where nothing new is being said, and downvote it. Doesn't really tell us much.

[varjag]

Honestly conflating coding with typing tells me your idea of coding is very different to what I used to do.

[embedding-shape]

Use whatever labels you want, apply charitable reading and I'm sure even you could understand what I mean here. Clearly there are at least two sorts of tasks (or used to anyways) in "software engineering" as a whole, one more mechanical and one more about thinking.

[varjag]

It just shows you haven't programmed computers much so your opinion is largely speculative.

[embedding-shape]

What exactly shows that? That I think thinking about code/design and typing code are two different activities? Maybe you disagree, around myself and my peers that'd be a minority perspective, but it's not speculative, based on real experience.

[antonvs]

> apply charitable reading and I'm sure even you could understand what I mean here.

Beautiful burn.

[skydhash]

Coding is literally writing code, instructions in plain text that control the behavior of computer. That implies knowing which instructions to write.

But creating software is much more than that. Just like writing an essay involves more than just typing words. Other activities include: Architecture, Requirements analysis, Debugging, Testing, Integration,…

[alecco]

But it's not like "shoving the logs into CNC machines". You have to understand what they are doing and point them into the right direction. LLMs very often lack common sense once you move out of easy things.

[varjag]

Yes you have to understand when the log stuck in CNC machine, if you want to put the carpentry analogy to its extreme.

[brookst]

I love programming CNC machines; I am a terrible carpenter. Someone still has to tell the LLMs what to build, specify design constraints and goals, etc

[varjag]

Yes, the easy part is still there.

[brookst]

Funny, working in product I think designing the right thing is far more difficult and interesting than just typing in source code.

[varjag]

You're the second person itt using an expression "typing in code". Guys I understand your excitement now that you too finally can make computers do what you want but it's not how programming worked at all.