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How I program with agents

crawshaw.io

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Re: How I program with agents

#71

Post by shitpostbot »

vmg12 wrote: post #13
zOneLetter wrote: post #7

Maybe it's because I only code for my own tools, but I still don't understand the benefit of relying on someone/something else to write your code and then reading it, understand it, fixing it, etc. Although asking an LLM to extract and find the thing I'm looking for in an API Doc is super useful and time saving. To me, it's not even about how good these LLMs get in the future. I just don't like reading other people's…

Here are the cases where it helps me (I promise this isn't ai generated even though im using a list...) - Formulaic code. It basically obviates the need for macros / code gen. The downside is that they are slower and you can't just update the macro and re-generate. The upside is it works for code that is slightly formulaic but has some slight differences across implementations that make macros impossible to use. - Us…

[dead]

Re: How I program with agents

#72

Post by svachalek »

almostdeadguy wrote: post #26

> Whether this understanding of engineering, which is correct for some projects, is correct for engineering as a whole is questionable. Very few programs ever reach the point that they are heavily used and long-lived. Almost everything has few users, or is short-lived, or both. Let’s not extrapolate from the experiences of engineers who only take jobs maintaining large existing products to the entire industry. I see…

I guess if you're generating some script to run on your own device then sure, why not. Vibe a little script to munge your files. Vibe a little demo for your next status meeting.

I think the tip-off is if you're pushing it to source control. At that point, you do intend for it to be long lived, and you're lying to yourself if you try to pretend otherwise.

Re: How I program with agents

#73

Post by addaon »

gejose wrote: post #57
zOneLetter wrote: post #7

Maybe it's because I only code for my own tools, but I still don't understand the benefit of relying on someone/something else to write your code and then reading it, understand it, fixing it, etc. Although asking an LLM to extract and find the thing I'm looking for in an API Doc is super useful and time saving. To me, it's not even about how good these LLMs get in the future. I just don't like reading other people's…

Just to draw a parallel (not to insult this line of thinking in any way): “ Maybe it's because I only code for my own tools, but I still don't understand the benefit of relying on someone/something else to _compile_ your code and then reading it, understand it, fixing it, etc” At a certain point you won’t have to read and understand every line of code it writes, you can trust that a “module” you ask it to build works…

> At a certain point you won’t have to read and understand every line of code it writes, you can trust that a “module” you ask it to build works exactly like you’d think it would, with a clearly defined interface to the rest of your handwritten code.

"A certain point" is bearing a lot of load in this sentence... you're speculating about super-human capabilities (given that even human code can't be trusted, and we have code review processes, and other processes, to partially mitigate that risk). My impression was that the post you were replying to was discussing the current state of the art, not some dimly-sensed future.

Re: How I program with agents

#74

Post by addaon »

rgbrenner wrote: post #68
zOneLetter wrote: post #7

Maybe it's because I only code for my own tools, but I still don't understand the benefit of relying on someone/something else to write your code and then reading it, understand it, fixing it, etc. Although asking an LLM to extract and find the thing I'm looking for in an API Doc is super useful and time saving. To me, it's not even about how good these LLMs get in the future. I just don't like reading other people's…

if you work on a team most code you see isn’t yours.. ai code review is really no different than reviewing a pr… except you can edit the output easier and maybe get the author to fix it immediately

> if you work on a team most code you see isn’t yours.. ai code review is really no different than reviewing a pr… except you can edit the output easier and maybe get the author to fix it immediately

And you can't ask "why" about a decision you don't understand (or at least, not with the expectation that the answer holds any particular causal relationship with the actual reason)... so it's like reviewing a PR with no trust possible, no opportunity to learn or to teach, and no possibility for insight that will lead to a better code base in the future. So, the exact opposite of reviewing a PR.

Re: How I program with agents

#75

Post by Groxx »

vmg12 wrote: post #28
mlinhares wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The downside for formulaic code kinda makes the whole thing useless from my perspective, I can't imagining a case where that works. Maybe a good case, that i've used a lot, is using "spreadsheet inputs" and teaching the LLM to produce test cases/code based on the spreadsheet data (that I received from elsewhere). The data doesn't change and the tests won't change either so the LLM definitely helps, but this isn't cod…

There is a lot of formulaic code that llms get right 90% of the time that are impossible to build macros for. One example that I've had to deal with is language bridge code for an embedded scripting language. Every function I want available in the scripting environment requires what is essentially a boiler plate function to be written and I had to write a lot of them.

There's also fuzzy datatype mapping in general, where they're like 90%+ identical but the remaining fields need minor special handling.

Building a generator capable of handling all variations you might need is extremely hard[1], and it still won't be good enough. An LLM will both get it almost perfect almost every time, and likely reuses your existing utility funcs. It can save you from typing out hundreds of lines, and it's pretty easy to verify and fix the things it got wrong. It's the exact sort of slightly-custom-pattern-detecting-and-following that they're good at.

1: Probably impossible, for practical purposes. It almost certainly makes an API larger than the Moon, which you won't be able to fully know or quickly figure out what you need to use due to the sheer size.

Re: How I program with agents

#76

Post by unshavedyak »

zOneLetter wrote: post #7

Maybe it's because I only code for my own tools, but I still don't understand the benefit of relying on someone/something else to write your code and then reading it, understand it, fixing it, etc. Although asking an LLM to extract and find the thing I'm looking for in an API Doc is super useful and time saving. To me, it's not even about how good these LLMs get in the future. I just don't like reading other people's…

> I just don't like reading other people's code lol.

I agree entirely and generally avoided LLMs because they couldn't be trusted. However a few days ago i said screw it and purchased Claude Max just to try and learn how i can use LLMs to my advantage.

So far i avoid it for things where they're vague, complex, etc. The effort i have to go through to explain it exceeds my own in writing it.

However for a bunch of things that are small, stupid, wastes of time - i find it has been very helpful. Old projects that need to migrate API versions, helper tools i've wanted but have been too lazy to write, etc. Low risk things that i'm too tired to do at the end of the day.

I have also found it a nice way to get movement on projects where i'm too tired to progress on after work. Eg mostly decision fatigue, but blank spaces seem to be the most difficult for me when i'm already tired. Planning through the work with the LLM has been a pretty interesting way to work around my mental blocks, even if i don't let it do the work.

This planning model is something i had already done with other LLMs, but Claude Code specifically has helped a lot in making it easier to just talk about my code, rather than having to supply details to the LLM/etc.

It's been far from perfect of course, but i'm using this mostly to learn the bounds and try to find ways to have it be useful. Tricks and tools especially, eg for Claude adding the right "memory" adjustments to my preferred style, behaviors (testing, formatting, etc) has helped a lot.

I'm a skeptic here, but so far i've been quite happy. Though i'm mostly going through low level fruit atm, i'm curious if 20 days from now i'll still want to renew the $100/m subscription.

Re: How I program with agents

#77

Post by HPsquared »

zOneLetter wrote: post #7

Maybe it's because I only code for my own tools, but I still don't understand the benefit of relying on someone/something else to write your code and then reading it, understand it, fixing it, etc. Although asking an LLM to extract and find the thing I'm looking for in an API Doc is super useful and time saving. To me, it's not even about how good these LLMs get in the future. I just don't like reading other people's…

The LLM has a much larger "working vocabulary" (so to speak) than I. It's more fluent.

It's easier to read a language you're not super comfortable with, than it is to write it.

Re: How I program with agents

#78

Post by atrettel »

spenczar5 wrote: post #69
atrettel wrote: post #65

The "assets" and "debt" discussion near the middle is interesting, but I can't say that I agree. Yes, many programs are not used my many users, but many programs that have a lot of users now and have existed for a long time started with a small audience and were only intended to be used for a short time. I cannot tell you how many times I have encountered scientific code that was haphazardly written for one purpose y…

The issue is, whats the alternative? People are generally bad at predicting what work will get broad adoption. Carefully elegantly constructing a project that goes nowhere also seems to be a common failure mode; there is a sort of evolutionary pressure towards sloppy projects succeeding because they are cheaper to produce. This reminds me of classics like "worse is better," for today's age ( https://www.dreamsongs.co…

You're right that there isn't a good alternative. I'll just describe that I try to do even if it is inadequate. I write the code as obviously as possible without taking more time (as a courtesy to myself), and I then document the scope of what I am writing when I write the code (what I intend for it to do and intend for it to not do). The documentation is a CYA measure. That way, if something does get elevated, well, I've described its limitations upfront.

And to be frank, in scientific circles, having documentation at all is a good smell test. I've seen so many projects that contain absolutely no documentation, so it is really easy to forget about the capabilities and limitations of a piece of software. It's all just taught through experience and conversations with other people. I'd rather have something in writing so that nobody, especially managers, misinterprets what a piece of software was designed to do or be good at. Even a short README saying this person wrote this piece of software to do this one task and only this one task is excellent.

Re: How I program with agents

#79

Post by asar »

ep103 wrote: post #47

Okay, so how do I set up the sort of agent / feedback loop he is describing? Can someone point me in the direction to do that? So far all I've done is just open up the windsurf IDE. Do I have to set this up from scratch?

Haven't used Windsurf yet, but in other tools this is called 'Agent' mode. So you open up the chat modal to talk to an LLM, then select 'Agent' mode and send your prompt.

Re: How I program with agents

#80

Post by fwip »

monkeydust wrote: post #18
bArray wrote: post #9

LLMs for code review, rather than code writing/design could be the killer feature. I think that code review has been broken for a while now, but this could be a way forward. Of particular interest would be security, undefined behaviour, basic misuse of features, double checking warnings out of the compiler against the source code to ensure it isn't something more serious, etc. My current use of LLMs is typically via…

Why isn't this spoken more about? Not a developer but work very closely with many - they are all on a spectrum from zero interest in this technology to actively using it to write code (correlates inversely seniority from my sample set) - very little talk on using it for reviews/checks - perhaps that needs to be done passively on commit.

So far, it seems pretty bad at code review. You'd get more mileage by configuring a linter.
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