[rramadass]

Yes, there is still a need to learn to write code by hand.

Maybe not to the detailed nitty-gritty level in a computer language that was needed pre-LLM era but nevertheless still a must.

In this context, it is good to revisit the practices from early days of programming where "System Analysts" and "System Designers" provided detailed specifications to "Programmers" who translated it into computer code. The key point to understand here is that the specifications were detailed i.e they were code just in a non-machine executable form.

So detailed Specifications followed by Verification is mandatory. Understanding the code implementation in-between has lesser need but still important.

See also my previous comment chains from here - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48800484