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Ask HN: AI impact on future developer career

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Re: Ask HN: AI impact on future developer career

#21

Post by ActorNightly »

The best field to go to is electrical engeering with a focus on computer engineering (EE/ECE), and I say that as an ex Aerospace Engineer who taught himself how to code and worked at startups and big tech.

Most every single talented ECE person can easily get any software job with minimal prep. Half of the leetocde style coding questions are pointer manipulations, the other half rely on some n linked lists, both of which you get a lot of exposure to when working with low level algorithms.

Furthermore, in the scope of AI, we aren't really close to AGI, and even if we were, the power draw of compute is still quite large. There is a lot of progress to be made in making the compute more accessible to average person.

Re: Ask HN: AI impact on future developer career

#22

Post by muzani »

ghoshbishakh wrote: post #10

All my devs who try to use ChatGPT or similar tools end up wasting more time that those who just jump into the code and try to work everything out themselves. How long till this balance changes is not known to me.

GPT-4 is able to do Leetcode with well over 90% accuracy, and all you have to do is give it a screenshot of the question. It takes another minute or so to find more optimal solutions. It's not the best, but if the entire value of a junior is solving Leetcode Hard questions, then ChatGPT is going to it faster and cheaper.

If you can phrase all programming in the style of a Stack Overflow or Leetcode problem, AI will solve it easily. But that's what's slower than jumping in. A middle ground is writing tests.

It does really badly on Swift and is benchmarked on Python. So there's still blind spots. It can't do frameworks like Ren'Py either.

Re: Ask HN: AI impact on future developer career

#23

Post by vunderba »

savorypiano wrote: post #11

Don't do it for the money.

Underrated comment of the century.

The insane lure of gob-smacking amounts of money that got thrown around the tech industry in the past decade with FAANGS unfortunately brought in a lot of people who really weren't passionate about computer science in the first place.

By way of contrast, compare your average software developer with an electrical/mechanical engineer. Just as challenging an industry (if not MORE SO in a lot of ways), and yet the pay is usually a fraction of what a software dev can make. Nobody becomes an EE for the money.

Re: Ask HN: AI impact on future developer career

#24

Post by hiAndrewQuinn »

ActorNightly wrote: post #21

The best field to go to is electrical engeering with a focus on computer engineering (EE/ECE), and I say that as an ex Aerospace Engineer who taught himself how to code and worked at startups and big tech. Most every single talented ECE person can easily get any software job with minimal prep. Half of the leetocde style coding questions are pointer manipulations, the other half rely on some n linked lists, both of wh…

Qualified agree. Personally, I knew since I was a teenager that if I wanted to end up in software, it would be "easy" for me (as in it would take time and practice, but I could do it fully self-taught - I just love doing it too much).

So instead of majoring in CS I majored in EE and mathematics. I did a lot of hard math and physical sciences stuff most of my peers didn't, and it still buys me an unusually large amount of latitude in the kinds of work people can trust me to take on.

Re: Ask HN: AI impact on future developer career

#25

Post by cultofthecow »

IMHO there is a huge misconception in what is the impact of AI. AI will not take engineering jobs. It will help engineers do more. That's it. Engineering is all about automation, performance improvement. Expectations will be "you have a wonderful tool, we expect you to do more".

Re: Ask HN: AI impact on future developer career

#26

Post by cultofthecow »

p1esk wrote: post #12
b20000 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

define “better at coding” and also estimate cost of fixing generated solutions

“Better at coding” as defined by seniority levels: GPT4 - an intern; GPT5 - a junior developer; GPT6 - a senior developer. Yes, GPT5 will do a lot of damage, as it will be the first model replacing actual human coders. But GPT6 should be able to fix most of the issues. During this transition period I expect human senior developers mostly doing code reviews.

Have you seen at leas one tool that is capable to replace a junior dev? At least one please. I would love to read anything about it.

Re: Ask HN: AI impact on future developer career

#27

Post by p1esk »

cultofthecow wrote: post #26
p1esk wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Better at coding” as defined by seniority levels: GPT4 - an intern; GPT5 - a junior developer; GPT6 - a senior developer. Yes, GPT5 will do a lot of damage, as it will be the first model replacing actual human coders. But GPT6 should be able to fix most of the issues. During this transition period I expect human senior developers mostly doing code reviews.

Have you seen at leas one tool that is capable to replace a junior dev? At least one please. I would love to read anything about it.

No, GPT5 is not out yet. As I said, it should be out within 6 months. Please be patient.

Re: Ask HN: AI impact on future developer career

#28

Post by cultofthecow »

p1esk wrote: post #27
cultofthecow wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you seen at leas one tool that is capable to replace a junior dev? At least one please. I would love to read anything about it.

No, GPT5 is not out yet. As I said, it should be out within 6 months. Please be patient.

Do you think it will be capable to replace a junior dev?

Re: Ask HN: AI impact on future developer career

#29

Post by neontomo »

ActorNightly wrote: post #21

The best field to go to is electrical engeering with a focus on computer engineering (EE/ECE), and I say that as an ex Aerospace Engineer who taught himself how to code and worked at startups and big tech. Most every single talented ECE person can easily get any software job with minimal prep. Half of the leetocde style coding questions are pointer manipulations, the other half rely on some n linked lists, both of wh…

what do you think about studying embedded systems engineering? i got accepted for august. so far, finding a team in this job market has been challenging so i'm forced to think longer term.

Re: Ask HN: AI impact on future developer career

#30

Post by p1esk »

cultofthecow wrote: post #28
p1esk wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, GPT5 is not out yet. As I said, it should be out within 6 months. Please be patient.

Do you think it will be capable to replace a junior dev?

Yes. It will go like that: “should we hire a senior dev and a junior dev? Nah, a senior dev plus GPT5 subscription should be enough to do the workload”. And it will be enough.
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