Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Writing code is cheap now

simonwillison.net

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 522 posts

Re: Writing code is cheap now

#41

Post by coldtea »

the_mitsuhiko wrote: post #15

I'm going to shill my own writing here [1] but I think it addresses this post in a different way. Because we can now write code so much faster and quicker, everything downstream from that is just not ready for it. Right now we might have to slow down, but medium and long term we need to figure out how to build systems in a way that it can keep up with this increased influx of code. > The challenge is to develop new p…

>but medium and long term we need to figure out how to build systems in a way that it can keep up with this increased influx of code.

Why? Why do we need to "write code so much faster and quicker" to the point we saturate systems downstream? I understand that we can, but just because we can, does'nt mean we should.

Re: Writing code is cheap now

#42

Post by ok123456 »

stackghost wrote: post #24
DrJid wrote: post #17

Code generation is cheap in the same way talk is cheap. Every human can string words together, but there's a world of difference between words that raise $100M and words that get you slapped in the face. The raw material was always cheap. The skill is turning it into something useful. Agentic engineering is just the latest version of that. The new skill is mastering the craft of directing cheap inputs toward valuable…

Indeed: The act of actually typing the code into an editor was never the hard or valuable part of software engineering. The value comes from being able to design applications that work well, with reasonable performance and security properties.

Then why did most software fail to do that even before the advent of LLMs?

Re: Writing code is cheap now

#43

Post by arghwhat »

arijun wrote: post #34
fmbb wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Raising $100M doesn’t even mean you have a good idea or an idea people like or an idea you can even make money on.

It’s probably a better indicator of a good business idea than if you get slapped in the face…

And yet, who would you trust more - a CEO that raised 100M on their "vision" or someone who got slapped in the face?

Re: Writing code is cheap now

#44

Post by dr-detroit »

DrJid wrote: post #17

Code generation is cheap in the same way talk is cheap. Every human can string words together, but there's a world of difference between words that raise $100M and words that get you slapped in the face. The raw material was always cheap. The skill is turning it into something useful. Agentic engineering is just the latest version of that. The new skill is mastering the craft of directing cheap inputs toward valuable…

[dead]

Re: Writing code is cheap now

#45

Post by noduerme »

Ronsenshi wrote: post #12

I'm very curious to see how this will affect the job market. All the recent CS grads, all the coding bootcamp graduates - where would they end up in? And then there's medium/senior engineers that would have to switch how they work to oversee the hordes of AI agents that all the hype evangelists are pushing on the industry. Not an employee market, that's for sure.

>> oversee the hordes of AI agents

This is the thing I don't really get. I enjoy tinkering with AI and seeing what it comes up with to solve problems. But when I need to write working code that does anything beyond simple CRUD, it's faster for me to write the code than it is to (1) describe the problem in English with sufficient detail and working theory, then (2) check the AI's work, understand what it's written, de-duplicate and dry it out.

I guess if I skipped step 2, it might save time, but it would be completely irresponsible to put it into production, so that's not an option in any world where I maintain code quality and the trust of my clients.

Plus, having AI code mixed into my projects also leaves me with an uneasy sense of being less able to diagnose future bugs. Yes, I still know where everything is, but I don't know it as well as if I'd written it myself. So I find myself going back and re-reviewing AI-written code, re-familiarizing myself with it, in order to be sure I still have a full handle on everything.

To the extent that it may save me time as an engineer, I don't mind using it. But the degree to which the evangelists can peddle it to the management of a company as a replacement for human coders seems highly correlated with whether that company's management understood the value of safe code in the first place. If they didn't, then their infrastructure may have already been garbage, but it will now become increasingly unusable garbage. At some point, I think there will be a backlash when the results in reality can no longer be denied, and engineers who can come in and clean up the mess will be in high demand. But maybe that's just wishful thinking.

Re: Writing code is cheap now

#46

Post by jdahlin »

candiddevmike wrote: post #32
jdahlin wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the most interesting aspects is when LLMs are cheap and small enough so that apps can ship with a builtin one so that it can adjust code for each user based on input/usage patterns.

If this could ever happen, there will be no point in GUI apps anymore, your AI assistant or what have you will just interact with everything on your behalf and/or present you with some kind of master interface for everything. I don't see a bunch of small agents in the future, instead just one per device or user. Maybe there will be a fleeting moment for GUI/local apps to tie into some local, OS LLM library (or some k…

Agents will still have to communicate with each other, the communication protocols, how data is stored, presented and queried will be important for us to decide?

Will we stop using web browsers as we understand them today in the next few decades in favor of only interacting with agents? Maybe.

Re: Writing code is cheap now

#47

Post by vntok »

nine_k wrote: post #6

This fact is opening the floodgates of low-end products, which are somehow better than nothing, but are embarrassing to use.

True, however as these products have been designed and coded by LLMs from the ground up in 2025+, they are generally using modern (typed even) languages, the latest version of third party libraries, usually have documentation of sorts... sometimes they even have test suites.

As such, they can often be improved as easily as one can prompt, which is much faster and easier than before. Notably in the FOSS world where one had to ask the maintainer, get ghosted for a year and have them go back with a "close: wontfix (too tedious)".

Re: Writing code is cheap now

#48

Post by firefoxd »

Yes writing code is easier than ever, my problem is that understanding it still costs the same if not more [0]. I get that when people use agents, understanding code is not the concern because it's not exactly catering to people, it's for other agents. But when maintaining applications that have been running for years now, I still believe we need to fully understand code before we commit.

[0]: https://idiallo.com/blog/writing-code-is-easy-reading-is-har...

Re: Writing code is cheap now

#49

Post by the_mitsuhiko »

coldtea wrote: post #41
the_mitsuhiko wrote: post #15

I'm going to shill my own writing here [1] but I think it addresses this post in a different way. Because we can now write code so much faster and quicker, everything downstream from that is just not ready for it. Right now we might have to slow down, but medium and long term we need to figure out how to build systems in a way that it can keep up with this increased influx of code. > The challenge is to develop new p…

> but medium and long term we need to figure out how to build systems in a way that it can keep up with this increased influx of code. Why? Why do we need to "write code so much faster and quicker" to the point we saturate systems downstream? I understand that we can, but just because we can, does'nt mean we should.

If we want to continue to ship at that speed we will have to. I’m not sure if we should, but seemingly we are. And it causes a lot of problems right now downstream.

Re: Writing code is cheap now

#50

Post by jazzypants »

jdahlin wrote: post #22
the_mitsuhiko wrote: post #15

I'm going to shill my own writing here [1] but I think it addresses this post in a different way. Because we can now write code so much faster and quicker, everything downstream from that is just not ready for it. Right now we might have to slow down, but medium and long term we need to figure out how to build systems in a way that it can keep up with this increased influx of code. > The challenge is to develop new p…

One of the most interesting aspects is when LLMs are cheap and small enough so that apps can ship with a builtin one so that it can adjust code for each user based on input/usage patterns.

I've heard this referenced multiple times and I have yet to hear the value be clearly articulated. Are you saying that every user would eventually be using a different app? Wouldn't it eventually get to the point that negates the need for the app developer anyways since you would eventually be unable to offer any kind of support, or are we just talking design changing while the actual functionality stays the same? How would something like this actually behave in reality?
Post reply on HN