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What's gonna happen to software engineers?

yakko.dev

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Re: What's gonna happen to software engineers?

#31

Post by sam0x17 »

prplfsh wrote: post #3

I really love using AI to code but more and more I wonder ... Are things really that different? So I guess I'm the business as usual type. I think on the frontend side we're going to see a lot more scope for teams. On a backend infra side it seems as hard as ever. Still have to think really hard problems, think deeply about data structure and flow, and deal with second- and third-order effects. Or even harder because…

What I like is it's still hard, but you can do things like "prove this using game theory" or "find the optimal value for this and a proof" without having to know game theory or deep math really

Re: What's gonna happen to software engineers?

#32

Post by hootz »

glouwbug wrote: post #28
slopinthebag wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah I mean, as far as I can tell the result of the agent mania is the same amount of software, but an acceleration in the decline of performance and quality. I'm also increasingly seeing early adopters going back to a more "traditional" approach to development. So idk, maybe the result will be more jobs fixing up all the vibe code while we transition to a more mature implementation of language models into our workfl…

I’ve noticed a massive reverse in AI sentiment in the last 3 weeks here on HN. It’s not that I don’t disagree, but I wonder what’s going on. Maybe it’s the IPO

Reversing to which direction? Because what I've always seen here is a pretty good mix of positive and negative sentiments. Usually we get a lot of AI related submissions, but with skeptics/opposers in the comments.

Re: What's gonna happen to software engineers?

#33

Post by stlark »

prplfsh wrote: post #3

I really love using AI to code but more and more I wonder ... Are things really that different? So I guess I'm the business as usual type. I think on the frontend side we're going to see a lot more scope for teams. On a backend infra side it seems as hard as ever. Still have to think really hard problems, think deeply about data structure and flow, and deal with second- and third-order effects. Or even harder because…

In my experience I'd have to agree. I'm shipping more and I'm onboarding onto domains faster but the same bottlenecks exist, the same complexities creep up and the same talents that help individuals push through are still relevant.

Re: What's gonna happen to software engineers?

#34

Post by operatingthetan »

oompydoompy74 wrote: post #18

Nothing. There will be more of us than ever as the amount of money each engineer can generate goes up. I’m not sure why everyone comes to the conclusion that there will be less engineers as productivity increases. We aren’t that expensive relative to the value we generate and AI, when wielded by an expert, will exponentially increase the amount of return a single engineer can generate.

>I’m not sure why everyone comes to the conclusion that there will be less engineers as productivity increases.

The politics of corporations is such that they don't actually want near infinite productivity. They require churn, cycles, a cadence.

Re: What's gonna happen to software engineers?

#36

Post by ai_fry_ur_brain »

dktp wrote: post #26
ai_fry_ur_brain wrote: post #6

[flagged]

People take pride in wearing handmade watches As of today, I've never heard of anyone taking pride in using a SaaS or frequenting a website or an app because it was handcrafted. Maybe some day

You're completely wrong.

Platforms that are obviously vibe slop are almost entirely ignored by those that value quality.

If your product has that cheap stench of AI I'll never trust it, I'll instantly think the creators are chumps and I'll look for any alternative that doesn't have that stench.

They all have that stench.

Re: What's gonna happen to software engineers?

#37

Post by englishspot »

prplfsh wrote: post #3

I really love using AI to code but more and more I wonder ... Are things really that different? So I guess I'm the business as usual type. I think on the frontend side we're going to see a lot more scope for teams. On a backend infra side it seems as hard as ever. Still have to think really hard problems, think deeply about data structure and flow, and deal with second- and third-order effects. Or even harder because…

I work on backend infra. I touch a lot of things and have multiple instances of claude code running at once. I do feel like I'm doing more simultaneously. but that's still more that I have to keep track of and make sense of in my head. claude is making me way more productive, for sure, but at the same time I feel way more overwhelmed than I've ever been.

idk how anyone else is doing it and managing all of this. supposedly there's people with large teams of agents that they can just trust to do everything end-to-end.

Re: What's gonna happen to software engineers?

#38

Post by glouwbug »

hootz wrote: post #32
glouwbug wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve noticed a massive reverse in AI sentiment in the last 3 weeks here on HN. It’s not that I don’t disagree, but I wonder what’s going on. Maybe it’s the IPO

Reversing to which direction? Because what I've always seen here is a pretty good mix of positive and negative sentiments. Usually we get a lot of AI related submissions, but with skeptics/opposers in the comments.

I’m not sure. I’ve been reading death-of-the-software engineer for years, but recently the -vibe- feels different. I don’t have anything anecdotal to back it up so take it with a grain of salt. I might be reading what I want to see

Re: What's gonna happen to software engineers?

#39

Post by seer »

I really liked reading through the Mars trilogy. It imagined a world where AI is used for fluent effortless translation - local languages get a renaissance since now you _dont_ need a lengua Franca, everyone just speaks what they like the most, and can understand everyone else. Much more “flavour” to human interaction.

Also ai makes things just resource constrained, not labour - whatever you imagined, you could make happen, just needed to “talk to an ai” about it. Lots of terraforming Mars / Venus in that book were imagined like that.

But it also analysed the social / political / behavioural aspects of it. Places that had to preserve old power structures - aka US/Europe/China - got engulfed with mega corps controlling everything etc.

But Mars - where people had enough freedom to imagine something different, came up with political/financial structures to incorporate all of that, and thrived.

I think it tried to play the card of “if US was being created right now - what would its ideals be” If you had a huge tract of land that was “free” and nobody (powerful enough) claiming it, and a population that didn’t yet have strong allegiances and could be persuaded to band together, what would AI, tech and all these years of progress allow us as humans to achieve politically.

Which also makes you feel kinda sad for the US in that world - it is the old rusted power center that can’t innovate and is stuck in the past…

Now it’s only sci fi of course, but it was quite interesting to imagine a world where AI gets smarter and smarter but never reaches that “sentient” threshold. I think the whole trilogy aged incredibly well all things considered.

Re: What's gonna happen to software engineers?

#40

Post by jwolfe »

therealdrag0 wrote: post #20
ai_fry_ur_brain wrote: post #6

[flagged]

I’m glad mass manufactured watches exist so the common man can afford them.

Fortunately the economics of infinitely copyable software aren't going anywhere. If there is actually a sizable market, it can be served with relatively little cost, compared to hand-producing physical goods. I am not fully convinced there will be such a market, though.
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