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Tell HN: I Lost Joy of Programming

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Re: Tell HN: I Lost Joy of Programming

#41

Post by osigurdson »

msgodel wrote: post #7

Vibe coding sounds miserable. I use LLMs pretty heavily but never as a replacement for my own mind. I'm glad it exists for the people who can't program but it's much less pleasant than being explicit myself.

For me, vibe coding is becoming more of a niche. I still use it but not that often. I prefer the Codex style workflow in which you do spent a lot more time on specifying things, providing examples and reviewing PRs.

Essentially, vibe coding is synchronous as it is necessary to wait around for the LLM to respond. Codex is async and allows you to focus on other things while it is working. The primary issue with async workflows is you really don't want to have to iterate much. Therefore, investing more time upfront clearly defining the prompt / agents.md and prior examples becomes really important. Usually if it is > 90% correct I will just fix the rest myself. For hand coding, I use a fairly basic vim setup with no LLM plugins. I do not like LLMs jumping in and trying to auto complete stuff.

Re: Tell HN: I Lost Joy of Programming

#43

Post by jedisct1 »

Using LLMs is just a different way of programming. Think of it as a high-level language, similar to how conventional programming languages relate to assembly.

Getting tasks done, tasks you would never have had the time or courage to tackle the traditional way, is another source of joy.

Re: Tell HN: I Lost Joy of Programming

#44

Post by kissgyorgy »

I don't understand why people only think in extremes.

You don't have to give up anything you did before at all.

LLMs just here to increase your productivity, but cranking out unreviewed code where you don't want to do that is just silly to me.

Re: Tell HN: I Lost Joy of Programming

#45

Post by roenxi »

John23832 wrote: post #4

I think that's just the way you're doing it? I feel the opposite. I appreciate the ability to iterate and prototype in a way which lowers friction. Sure I have to plan steps out ahead of time, but that's expected with any kind of software architecture. The stimulating part is the design and thought and learning, not digging the ditch. If you're just firing off prompts all day with no design/input, yea I'm sure that s…

> This is a huge red flag that you have no idea what you're doing at the fundamental software architecture level imo. Or at least you have bad process (prior to LLMs).

Particularly in the present. If any of the current models can consistently make senior-level decisions I'd like to know which ones they are. They're probably going to cross that boundary soon, but they aren't there yet. They go haywire too often. Anyone who codes only using the current generation of LLM without reviewing the code is surely capping themselves in code quality in a way that will hurt maintainability.

Re: Tell HN: I Lost Joy of Programming

#46

Post by gwd »

John23832 wrote: post #4

I think that's just the way you're doing it? I feel the opposite. I appreciate the ability to iterate and prototype in a way which lowers friction. Sure I have to plan steps out ahead of time, but that's expected with any kind of software architecture. The stimulating part is the design and thought and learning, not digging the ditch. If you're just firing off prompts all day with no design/input, yea I'm sure that s…

> I feel the opposite. I appreciate the ability to iterate and prototype in a way which lowers friction.

I feel the same way. Things I like: Thinking about architectures and algorithms. Things I don't like: Starting out with a blank slate, looking up the exact function names or parameters. I find it much easier to take something roughly implemented and improve upon it than to start from nothing and build it.

I think about what I want fairly specifically. I discuss it with the LLM. It implements something. Half of the time it's what I expect, I can move on. Sometimes it's done something I wasn't expecting in a better way, which is nice. Frequently it's done something I wasn't expecting in a worse way; I either tell it to fix it, or just fix it myself.

In my previous role, I did a huge amount of patch review, which I always found quite tedious. Even though this looks superficially similar, it doesn't have the same vibe at all. I think it's because the LLM will accept being told what to do in a way no self-respecting coder would. (One complaint I'd heard about another person's reviews was that the person whose code was reviewed felt like they were a marionette, just typing exactly what the reviewer told them to type.)

This way I can do the things I enjoy, while neither having to worry about some human being's feelings, nor having to do the low-level stuff that's a chore.

Re: Tell HN: I Lost Joy of Programming

#47

Post by whywhywhywhy »

I can't escape the feeling that in 2-4 years no one will be even looking at the code and the IDE+chat interface of today will be a weird relic and most people will be just prompting finished artifacts.

I'd say if you used to find pleasure and satisfaction if the art of writing code unless you're willing to stop using AI it might be worth finding a different pursuit to channel that energy into. If you don't enjoy prompting now it's only going to get worse from here and your energy will be better spent finding something you do enjoy.

Re: Tell HN: I Lost Joy of Programming

#48

Post by jvanderbot »

jon-wood wrote: post #24

Have you considered not doing that? It's not obligatory to have an LLM shit out unreviewed code for you, you're making a choice to do that, and you can make a choice not to. Review the code. Hell, maybe even write some code yourself. What you're describing is how I feel whenever I use an LLM for anything more than the most basic of tasks. I've gone from being a senior level software developer to managing a barely com…

Not OP, but you nailed my feelings perfectly. I did not like managing for precisely this reason, and it never got better. The trenches are for me.

Re LLMs I love collaborative coding because I can sometimes pick up or teach new tricks. If I'm too tired to type the boilerplate I sometimes use an LLM. These are the only two redeeming values of LLM agents: they produce code or designs I can start from when I ask them too. I rarely do.

I hope OP can find a balance that works. It's sad to see the (claimed) state of the art be a soulless crank we have to turn.

Re: Tell HN: I Lost Joy of Programming

#49

Post by MartinMcGirk »

What I have found is that using LLM’s to do the same stuff I already knew how to do is not super enjoyable. I know web application development, and having some agent build it for me is just a productivity gain with no job satisfaction. So I’ve been where you are recently.

But on the flip-side, using the AI to help me learn the bits of programming that I’ve spent my whole career ignoring, like setting up DevOps pipelines or containerisation, has been very enjoyable indeed. Pre-AI the amount of hassle I’d have to go through to get the syntax right and the infrastructure set up was just prohibitively annoying. But now that so much of the boilerplate is just done for me, and now that I’ve got a chat window I can use to ask all my stupid questions, it’s all clicking into place. And it’s like discovering a new programming paradigm all over again.

Can 100% recommend stepping outside your comfort zone and using AI to help where you didn’t want to go before.

Re: Tell HN: I Lost Joy of Programming

#50

Post by vinnymac »

Winsaucerer wrote: post #17

Is AI genuinely that good for you all? I can't leave it to its own devices, I have to review everything because (from experience) I don't trust it. I think it's an amazing technological advancement, perhaps will go down as one of the top 10 in the history of our species. But I can't just "fire and forget". And that's not just because its output is often not the best, but also because by doing it myself it causes me t…

I don’t think you’re doing anything wrong. Some shops just have very low quality bars where they can ship things that are to be frank, broken. I tend to use Sonnet 4 these days, and use it for tasks that aren’t too important or ones that require prototyping and iteration over perfection.

I find it’s really great for augmenting specific kinds of concentrated tasks. But just like you, I have to review everything it creates. Even Claude Opus 4 on MAX produces many bugs on a regular basis that I fix before merging in a change. I don’t mind it though, as I can choose to use it on the most annoying areas, and leave the ones I enjoy to work on myself.

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