Lessons for Agentic Coding: What should we do when code is cheap?
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Re: Lessons for Agentic Coding: What should we do when code is cheap?
#2Realize it's going to be 10-100x more expensive once you have no way back?
Re: Lessons for Agentic Coding: What should we do when code is cheap?
#3I've found the get-shit-done tool[1] to be quite useful for forcing me to properly plan the implementation and ensuring the context remains small and relevant at all times.
It is slower than when I was just using Claude directly though.
Re: Lessons for Agentic Coding: What should we do when code is cheap?
#4Realize it's going to be 10-100x more expensive once you have no way back?
What will close the way back?
Re: Lessons for Agentic Coding: What should we do when code is cheap?
#5I am in India, junior developer hiring is all down. Ai has reduced offshoring to India and eliminated the need for janitor work (often offloaded to juniors).
Many people are finding it difficult to even land internships.
The most affected areas are sysadmin, devops, and frontend. Where you'll have very hard time getting any offer.
Companies like BrowserStack are withdrawing campus placement offers.
Meanwhile, I am writing apps for my own use and have reached 10,000+ monthly active users already, even though I am making zero money from doing all this, but it's fun.
Re: Lessons for Agentic Coding: What should we do when code is cheap?
#6I came here exactly to point out what I'm glad to see is 10. "Free as in puppies" is a wonderful way to put it.
Every time I open linkedin I'm scared of how many big heads have taken the wrong lesson that coding almost free == free engineering. So many bait posts asking engineers why they would need to pay them any longer, or being glad they're generating millions of lines a month....this is going to end badly.
Re: Lessons for Agentic Coding: What should we do when code is cheap?
#7Realize it's going to be 10-100x more expensive once you have no way back?
What will close the way back?
You cutoff a generation of juniors from employment and learning , the seniors are gone and it's all harnesses and AI systems.
I'm not all gloom and doom but the treatment of junior engineers is something I think we will either regret or rejoice. Either will have a spur of creative people doing their own independent thing or we'll have lost a generation of great engineers.
Re: Lessons for Agentic Coding: What should we do when code is cheap?
#8Realize it's going to be 10-100x more expensive once you have no way back?
What will close the way back?
Lack of developers, if juniors don't get hired they will move onto other industries.
Company brain drain, knowledge leaves with your seniors if you decide to get rid of them, or they just leave due to the conditions AI creates.
I don't know if the above comes to fruition, there's a lot of questions that only time will answer. But those are my first thoughts.
Re: Lessons for Agentic Coding: What should we do when code is cheap?
#9I've found the get-shit-done tool[1] to be quite useful for forcing me to properly plan the implementation and ensuring the context remains small and relevant at all times. It is slower than when I was just using Claude directly though. [1] https://github.com/gsd-build/get-shit-done
I've tried this, it's honestly not worth the amount of time (and additional context) for the results. I've had more success prompting Claude with manageable and testable iterations.
Planning is good but get-shit-done just added too much planning in my opinion.
Re: Lessons for Agentic Coding: What should we do when code is cheap?
#10Realize it's going to be 10-100x more expensive once you have no way back?
What will close the way back?
Brain drain.
If you fire all your SWEs they won't sit around twiddling their thumbs waiting for an AI collapse, they'll career shift. Maybe to an unemployment line and/or homelessness, maybe to something else productive, but either way they'll lose SWE skills.
If you close down all the SWE junior positions you'll strongly discourage young people training in the field. They'll do something else.
Then if you want to go back, who will you hire for it?