I have been using copilot for two months and I find it more annoying than useful, am the only one that feel like this?, I also used tabnine, and it gives a lot of syntax errors in rust, so I could barely use it for a week. I definitely can agree that copilot is better than tabnine, but I feel like writing code is the easy part of programming, and copilot doesn't offer a crazy help to justify the monthly payment and t…
Coping with Copilot
181–190 of 463 posts
Re: Coping with Copilot
#182Re: Coping with Copilot
#183I understand the problem here and I sympathize with professors in these circumstances. Learning the fundamentals will remain important. But as others have pointed out: if students are unwilling to learn, or are taking shortcuts, it will ultimately hurt them in the long run. One thing tho is that things like Copilot put the lie to the hypothesis (propagated mostly by the Google-style job interview) that intensely codi…
I've been writing code for nearly as long and man, you have to try it. It's more like autocomplete on roids than something that generates Fibonacci methods automagically.
Until then, copilot is a giant liability that ensures I can't use it for code that my company ends up owning, nor can I contribute code I write with it to literally any open source project because in a very real sense: I didn't write it. I just assembled it from parts unknown, and those parts may end up being lawsuits.
Re: Coping with Copilot
#184I understand the problem here and I sympathize with professors in these circumstances. Learning the fundamentals will remain important. But as others have pointed out: if students are unwilling to learn, or are taking shortcuts, it will ultimately hurt them in the long run. One thing tho is that things like Copilot put the lie to the hypothesis (propagated mostly by the Google-style job interview) that intensely codi…
> if students are unwilling to learn, or are taking shortcuts, it will ultimately hurt them in the long run That's a very limited, and dismissive view. If you allow students to use copilot, you're handing out certificates or diplomas to people who can't code. That will very quickly erode the value of your institute's certification, and with it, that of the other students. Otherwise, why not give everyone an MSc in CS…
Certainly there are a lot of pros and cons to getting a BA in CS. But "learning how to write code" is not the major advantage of a university education, nor should it be.
Re: Coping with Copilot
#185I understand the problem here and I sympathize with professors in these circumstances. Learning the fundamentals will remain important. But as others have pointed out: if students are unwilling to learn, or are taking shortcuts, it will ultimately hurt them in the long run. One thing tho is that things like Copilot put the lie to the hypothesis (propagated mostly by the Google-style job interview) that intensely codi…
If you’re writing code you are the audience for copilot. Just try it
Re: Coping with Copilot
#186I understand the problem here and I sympathize with professors in these circumstances. Learning the fundamentals will remain important. But as others have pointed out: if students are unwilling to learn, or are taking shortcuts, it will ultimately hurt them in the long run. One thing tho is that things like Copilot put the lie to the hypothesis (propagated mostly by the Google-style job interview) that intensely codi…
I think the hypothesis is, rather, that people who can successfully run that gauntlet are smart and motivated. The details of the problems they’re solving along the way are almost incidental.
Re: Coping with Copilot
#187Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think the big change here is how much easier it is? Students, like everyone else, are lazy. Previously just doing the assignment was typically less work than cheating, and Copilot makes that much less common.
Type the assignment into google and press enter vs type it as a comment and press tab? Seems roughly the same amount of effort, and since Copilot is not free anymore most students won't bother paying for access on any kind of scale that matters. Whoever was going to cheat will cheat regardless. Besides it's one of those "you won't have a calculator with you everyday" fallacies. If you can solve problems with Copilot…
Re: Coping with Copilot
#188The scrolljacking on this site is awful. Why do people keep doing this?
Re: Coping with Copilot
#189I understand the problem here and I sympathize with professors in these circumstances. Learning the fundamentals will remain important. But as others have pointed out: if students are unwilling to learn, or are taking shortcuts, it will ultimately hurt them in the long run. One thing tho is that things like Copilot put the lie to the hypothesis (propagated mostly by the Google-style job interview) that intensely codi…
> if students are unwilling to learn, or are taking shortcuts, it will ultimately hurt them in the long run That's a very limited, and dismissive view. If you allow students to use copilot, you're handing out certificates or diplomas to people who can't code. That will very quickly erode the value of your institute's certification, and with it, that of the other students. Otherwise, why not give everyone an MSc in CS…
Most institutions have been granting CS diplomas to people that cannot code for decades.
Those people tend not to find long-lasting programming jobs.
Re: Coping with Copilot
#190Earlier quoted context omitted.
I will try it at some point, but I have... feelings... about its abuse of open source licenses software as a learning set. Also I work in Rust these days, and use CLion. Not sure if it would be much help in that environment.
How is it abusive?