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I started programming when I was 7. I'm 50 now and the thing I loved has changed

jamesdrandall.com

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Re: I started programming when I was 7. I'm 50 now and the thing I loved has changed

#281

Post by alexgarden »

CoastalCoder wrote: post #249
alexgarden wrote: post #48

Wow... I really relate to this. I'm 50 as well, and I started coding in 1985 when I was 10... I remember literally every evolutionary leap forward and my experience with this change has been a bit different. Steve Yegge recently did an interview on vibe coding ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuJyJP517Uw ) where he says, "arch mage engineers who fell out-of-love with the modern complexity of shipping meaningful code…

The original Homeworld team was casting spells! I'm still amazed by how you got ships to usually fly in formation, but also behave independently and rationally when that made sense. That game was a magnificent piece of art. It set a unique and immersive vibe on par with the original Tron movie. I'm really glad I have a chance now to tell you.

Thanks... It was magical at the time... I've thought a lot about why it was magical over the years... I think if you boil away all the space stuff, Homeworld was a story about people who knew in their hearts that they were special and destined for something greater than the universe was willing to allow. And they went through hell to discover that they were right. Looking back, I think that's a story a lot of us on this thread (inc. me) can relate to.

Here we are. Looks like the dorks won.

Re: I started programming when I was 7. I'm 50 now and the thing I loved has changed

#282

Post by dogleash »

serf wrote: post #24

6 or 7 , 38 now -- and having a blast. it isn't all funeral marches and group crying sessions. And don't let the blog post fool you , it is a rant about AI -- otherwise we would have heard complaints about the last 200 paradigm shifts in the industry over the past thirty years. Sure, we got our share of dilbert-style agile/waterfall/tdd jokes shoved in our face, but no one wrote a blog post about how their identity w…

> otherwise we would have heard complaints about the last 200 paradigm shifts in the industry over the past thirty years.

We have though. And they all received some version of "piss off, geezer."

Have you not noticed how the hype cycles and counter-hype haters buried most of the meaningful considered conversations about new technologies and methodologies across your career?

Re: I started programming when I was 7. I'm 50 now and the thing I loved has changed

#283

Post by jnwatson »

randusername wrote: post #66

A lot of that magic still remains in embedded. If vendors can't be bothered to use a C compiler from the last decade, I don't think they'll be adopting AI anytime soon. At my work, as of 2026, we only now have a faction riled up about evangelizing clean code, OOP, and C++ design patterns. I hope the same delay keeps for all the rest of the "abstraction tower".

It is happening in embedded as well. I noticed just the upgrade from Gemini 2.5 to 3.0 Pro went from "I can get the assembly syntax mostly right but I don't understand register lifetimes" to "I can generate perfect assembly by hand".

I just saw a Reddit post yesterday about somebody that successfully one-shot in Gemini 2.5 the bare metal boot code for a particular board with the only input being the board's documentation.

Re: I started programming when I was 7. I'm 50 now and the thing I loved has changed

#284

Post by alexgarden »

dirkc wrote: post #227
alexgarden wrote: post #48

Wow... I really relate to this. I'm 50 as well, and I started coding in 1985 when I was 10... I remember literally every evolutionary leap forward and my experience with this change has been a bit different. Steve Yegge recently did an interview on vibe coding ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuJyJP517Uw ) where he says, "arch mage engineers who fell out-of-love with the modern complexity of shipping meaningful code…

> I don't personally think there is magic in building a Docker container. Call me old-fashioned. I still vividly remember setting up gcc in a docker container to cross compile custom firmware for my cannon camera and thinking about the amount of pain my local system would have been in if I had to do all the toolchain work in my host OS. Don't know if it felt like magic, but it sure didn't hurt like the alternative!

For sure. Docker is rad (sorry Docker!)... all I'm saying is that I am not proud of the fact that I can do it and I don't think it moves the awesome needle - but it's still hard to get right and a pain in the ass. It's just an example of something I appreciate that I can automate now.

Re: I started programming when I was 7. I'm 50 now and the thing I loved has changed

#285

Post by randcraw »

small_model wrote: post #232

Same as assembly programmers felt when C came along I guess

I don't think so. A decent C programmer could pretty much imagine how each line of C was translated into assembly, and with certainty, how every byte of data moved through the machine. That's been lost with the rise of higher-level languages, interpreters, their pseudocode, and the explosion of libraries and especially, the rise of cut-and-paste coding. IMO, 90% of today's developers have never thought about how their code connects to the metal. Starting with CS101 in Java, they've always lived entirely within an abstract level of source code. Coding with AI just abstracts that world a couple steps higher, not unlike the way that templates in 4GL languages attempted but failed to achieve, but of course, the abstraction has climbed far beyond that level now. Software craftsmanship has indeed left the building; only the product matters now.

Re: I started programming when I was 7. I'm 50 now and the thing I loved has changed

#286

Post by alexgarden »

dave_sid wrote: post #269
samiv wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just told my gardener to cut the grass and work on some flower installations. I'm so excited about gardening again. Can't wait to do some. Employing a gardener to do my gardening for me is really making me enjoy gardening again!

No you didn’t. You lead a team of gardeners to develop your grand vision. Or you directed an epic movie leading a cast of talented actors bringing your vision to life. You can choose an empowering analogy or a negative one it’s your choice.

Yeah... a team of gardeners who might, with no warning, decide to burn down your house to create some extra fertilizer for the rose garden. Sometimes I wonder...

Re: I started programming when I was 7. I'm 50 now and the thing I loved has changed

#287

Post by takklob »

Der_Einzige wrote: post #168
JeremyNT wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a part of it, but I also feel like a Luddite (the historical meaning, not the derogatory slang). I do use these tools, clearly see their potential, and know full well where this is going: capital is devaluing labor. My skills will become worthless. Maybe GP is right that at first only skilled developers can wield them to full effect, but it's obviously not going to stop there. If I could destroy these things…

[flagged]

[flagged]

Re: I started programming when I was 7. I'm 50 now and the thing I loved has changed

#288

Post by zzrrt »

mlaretallack wrote: post #233
mosburger wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this is a great analogy despite it possibly coming off as snark. I think it's hard for some people to grasp that programmers are motivated by different things. Some are motivated by shipping products to users, others are motivated to make code that's a giant elegant cathedral, still others love glorious hacks to bend the machine into doing things it was never really intended to do. And I'm sure I'm missing a few othe…

I agree with this, I put myself in the "glorious hacks to bend the machine into doing things it was never really intended to do" camp, so the end game is somthing cool, now I can do 3 cool things before lunch instead of 3 cool things a year

But, almost by definition of how LLMs work, if it’s that easy then someone else did it before and the AI is just copying their work for you. This doesn’t fit well with my idea of glorious hacks to bend the machine, personally. I don’t know, maybe it just breaks my self-delusion that I am special and make unique things. At least I get to discover for myself what is possible and how, and hold a sliver of hope that I did something new. Maybe at least my journey there was unique, whereas everyone using an AI basically has the same journey and same destination (modulo random seed I guess.)

Re: I started programming when I was 7. I'm 50 now and the thing I loved has changed

#289

Post by olegp »

alexgarden wrote: post #48

Wow... I really relate to this. I'm 50 as well, and I started coding in 1985 when I was 10... I remember literally every evolutionary leap forward and my experience with this change has been a bit different. Steve Yegge recently did an interview on vibe coding ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuJyJP517Uw ) where he says, "arch mage engineers who fell out-of-love with the modern complexity of shipping meaningful code…

I couldn't agree more. Also, thanks for making Homeworld, it was great!

I was building a 3D space game engine myself as a kid around the time Homeworld came out and realized that rather than using a skybox with texture maps, you had it created out of a bunch of triangles with color interpolation.

IIRC, I had problems reverse engineering your data format in order to incorporate them in my engine. I emailed someone on your team and was very surprised to get a reply with an explanation, which helped me finish that feature.

Re: I started programming when I was 7. I'm 50 now and the thing I loved has changed

#290

Post by p-t »

neilellis wrote: post #273
p-t wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i agree. it seem like an expectation these days to use AI sometimes... for me i am happy not using it at all, i like to be able to say "I made this" :)

I suppose the question is "Do you feel Steve Jobs made the iPhone?" Not saying right/wrong but it's a useful Rorschach Test - about what you feel defines 'making this'?

it's more just a personal want to be able to see what I can do on my own tbh; i don't generally judge other people on that measure

although i do think Steve Jobs didn't make the iPhone /alone/, and that a lot of other people contributed to that. i'd like to be able to name who helps me and not say "gemini". again, it's more of a personal thing lol

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