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Vibe engineering

simonwillison.net

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Re: Vibe engineering

#711

Post by jama211 »

paool wrote: post #145
keeda wrote: post #134

I think we should just accept that vibe-coding has now semantically shifted to mean all AI-assisted coding. Actually, it makes sense to me even when a human is interacting directly with the code, because it feels a lot like pair-programming. As such, I really am "vibing" with the AI. But then the original meaning of vibe-coding -- as in, "Take the wheel, LLama of God" -- does need a new term, because that will also b…

Disagree, I think vibe coders should become synonymous with no-code and continue to be somewhat of a pejorative. I don't like the term vibe engineer, but do agree there needs to be a term to signifiy the difference. It's also possible in the future just being called a developer/engineer already implies you use coding agents and the people who do it "by hand" will not be the norm.

Doesn’t need to be a pejorative. Just a different category. Unless you require your daily dose of feeling superior to others of course

Re: Vibe engineering

#712

Post by jama211 »

pacomerh wrote: post #108
plainOldText wrote: post #54

A better term would be “Augmented Engineering” (AE). You want something to inspire engineers to do their best work. When you can expand your capabilities using the power of AI, then yeah, you can do your best work; hence augmented engineering . But vibing? Not so much. I guess AE could also stand for Advanced Engineering , after all the AI gives you the power to access and understand the latest in engineering knowled…

I wouldn't worry too much about what to call it. Assigning a distinct label separates it from traditional engineering in a way that it assumes AI-assisted coding is only for a subset of developers. At some point the unusual approach will be writing code without any AI assistance. So the transition will leave the "vibe" behind.

Well said

Re: Vibe engineering

#713

Post by jama211 »

taylorlunt wrote: post #104

These seem like a lot of great ways to work around the limitations of LLMs. But I'm curious what people here think. Do any career software engineers here see more than a 10% boost to their coding productivity with LLMs? I see how if you can't really code, or you're new to a domain, then it can make a huge difference getting you started, but if you know what you're doing I find you hit a wall pretty quickly trying to…

LLMs have been useful for years now and people still say stuff like “but is it really useful or are all these brilliant people just deluded”…

Re: Vibe engineering

#714

Post by rglynn »

gonzo41 wrote: post #84
DowsingSpoon wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you’re looking at the AI-generated output then you’re not Vibe Coding. Period. Let’s not dilute and destroy the term just as it’s beginning to become a useful label.

Wait, are people not reading the AI code they use?

The whole point of the term is to convey that you are only looking at the output and not looking under the hood. If vibe coding a UI, you only look at the UI, not the CSS.

Re: Vibe engineering

#715

Post by infomiho »

I've been successfully "vibe engineering" with Claude Code for a week now on a side quest at my job. I want the result to be of high enough quality to maybe survive in our codebase long-term, but I don't want to write it myself.

So I've added unit tests, e2e tests, formatting checks to help Claude to self-correct as much as possible. And I make him do a TON of self-review, after each feature I say something like:

> You are a master reviewer, lots of practical experience. Read Clean Code. Great at architecture. Read Effective Typescript as well. What would you comment in a PR review? Type checking MUST PASS, unit tests must PASS, formatting must PASS.

With each review, Claude catches a lot of sub-optimal choices it made which gives me more confidence in the code I get in the end.

Re: Vibe engineering

#716

Post by alganet »

simonw wrote: post #548
alganet wrote: post #543

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the other part of your goal?

Sparking more conversations about practices that work for doing serious production-quality software development with LLMs, especially in larger teams and on larger projects. Having a good counter to people who use "vibe coding" as a dismissive term for anything where an LLM is used to help product software.

That sounds so familiar. Have you ever considered that LLMs are the new PHP?

- A reasonable technology that can be used to deliver great value.

- People hate it.

- Terrible first impression. The wrong way of using PHP is much more popular than the good stuff.

- People are very dismissive, they won't even listen to your argument.

Re: Vibe engineering

#717

Post by sarchertech »

jama211 wrote: post #710
sarchertech wrote: post #83

When pigeons are offered random rewards from a treat dispenser, they start doing all kinds of funny little dances and movements because they think the rewards are in response to their actions.

I don’t know what you’re trying to imply here but it sounds very strongly like it is put in bad faith.

I’m critiquing the term “vibe engineering” by highlighting that because of the random, chaotic, black box nature of LLMs it is very difficult to distinguish valid techniques from superstitions.

Thus what you are doing is closer to pigeons bobbing their heads to attempt to influence the random reward machine than it is to engineering.

For example saying things like “It is critical that you don’t delete working code” might actually be a valid general technique, or it might have just been something that appeared to work because of randomness, or it might be something that is needed for current models but won’t be necessary in a few months.

The nature of LLMs makes correctly identifying superstition nearly impossible. And the speed with which new models are released makes trying to do so akin to doing physics in a universe where the laws of nature are constantly changing.

You’re an alchemist mixing gunpowder and sacrificing chickens to fire spirits, not an engineer, and for the foreseeable future you have no hope of becoming an engineer.

I’m also highlighting the insanely addictive nature of random rewards.

Re: Vibe engineering

#718

Post by bookofjoe »

FWIW, from the perspective of a non-coder: the tone of the comments in the discussion here is markedly different from those on similar topics six months ago and earlier in that there is no rage and contempt for LLM/vibe coding any more, but rather a reasoned discussion.

Re: Vibe engineering

#719

Post by jappgar »

pron wrote: post #671
herval wrote: post #653

Earlier quoted context omitted.

no, the point is LLMs will behave the same way humans you have to manage do (there's obviously differences - eg LLMs tend to forget context more often than most humans, but also they tend to know a lot more than the average human). So some of the same skills that'll help you manage humans will also help you get more consistency out of LLMs.

I don't know of anyone who would like to work with someone who lies to them over and over, and will never stop. LLMs do certain things better than people, but my point is that there's nothing you can trust them to do. That's fine for research (we don't trust, and don't need to trust, any human or tool to do a fully exhaustive research, anyway), but not for most other work tasks. That's not to say that LLMs can't be u…

Anthropomorphizing LLMs is not going to help anyone. They're not "lying" to you. There's no intent to deceive.

I really think that the people who have the hardest time adapting to AI tools are the ones that take everything personally.

It's just a text generator, not a colleague.

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