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Lines of code got a better publicist

curlewis.co.nz

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Re: Lines of code got a better publicist

#211

Post by cratermoon »

jcelerier wrote: post #65
JCTheDenthog wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>All else being equal, and assuming you are building the right thing, being able to deliver more correct lines of code is a good thing. Why? If you can deliver the same thing in fewer correct lines of code wouldn't that be preferable? At a bare minimum if you're still insisting on using AI to slop out your project, having it do things in fewer lines of code means you can fit more into your LLM's context window.

> If you can deliver the same thing in fewer correct lines of code it really depends on what you're doing. If your goal is "become interoperable with the N different and incompatible network protocols that people have devised for doing task X" I'd really like to know a solution that doesn't have at least some part of the amount of code that scales with N. Example: consider https://bitfocus.io/connections which connec…

This is still not an argument for more lines of code. It demonstrates that lines of code are positively correlated with number of features, yes. But that's like saying the number of nails scales with the size of a house. More nails does not create more house.

Re: Lines of code got a better publicist

#213

Post by dmurray »

bitwize wrote: post #85
marcosdumay wrote: post #19

Weird baseless push for AI on the end, with no reasoning, no goal, no claim of gain. "Just go and use AI, people, developers must adopt new things." It's not the first article I've read recently that is an ad for AI after a short context pretending to criticize it, with nothing connecting them.

AI is the new cloud. There's no market for people or companies who aren't committed to it. If you're a dev who refuses to use AI, no company will hire you; and should a company decide not to use AI they will have a hard time retaining devs (and they will need more devs). Their investors and big-ticket customers will also think twice before signing off on major commitments. So yes, use AI. Don't nitpick the costs and…

It's much more than that. There's plenty of market for people and companies who don't specialise in cloud software. The market for programmers who don't use AI is going to be more like the market for programmers who don't use compilers.

Re: Lines of code got a better publicist

#214

Post by chrismarlow9 »

sanderjd wrote: post #113
tedggh wrote: post #32

If your A+ senior developer spends 8 months working on a feature that ultimately doesn’t get shipped or a MVP that gets killed, then you wasted that A+ senior developer and their productivity was the same as the other two B+ engineers that also worked on the project. This is actually a very common issue and usually ignored when it comes to things like hiring or assigning resources to a project. AI won’t change that i…

I think engineers tend to over index on this kind of thing being "waste". You didn't waste that investment, you paid for the option to ship that feature or MVP and the research into the question of whether it made sense to ship it.

That's cool but don't get heart broken when engineers leave after repeatedly being told the thing they worked on for months wont ship because someone at the top said so.

Re: Lines of code got a better publicist

#215

Post by geraneum »

tedggh wrote: post #32

If your A+ senior developer spends 8 months working on a feature that ultimately doesn’t get shipped or a MVP that gets killed, then you wasted that A+ senior developer and their productivity was the same as the other two B+ engineers that also worked on the project. This is actually a very common issue and usually ignored when it comes to things like hiring or assigning resources to a project. AI won’t change that i…

> spends 8 months working on a feature

Are you sure those 8 months is not being spent on just “coding”? There’s design, product team input and iteration, etc. Where did you see that an A+ engineer goes into a cubicle and come X months after with an MVP in isolation?

Re: Lines of code got a better publicist

#216

Post by dktoao »

gedy wrote: post #78

I'm reminded of my first tech job about 25 years that had some not very technical manager who had a technical toady write up a script to check lines of code added as a productivity measure. I was in big trouble because it didn't account for lines removed or modified, only new lines added. The copy paste guy was praised of course for how productive he was for. Funny how AI is continuing the same story of non/semi tech…

Instead of building up a sane system for handling dependencies, just copy-paste them whole cloth into your code! Instant rockstar status!

Re: Lines of code got a better publicist

#217

Post by selicos »

QuercusMax wrote: post #165
DrewADesign wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> how little I know about technology. Probably because you smoked too much weed in school. Remember, this is the tech industry! An abject lack of knowledge is no impediment for people with boundless confidence in their assumptions!

Ya gotta start smoking weed after you're done with school, that's the way to success

The best strategy is to figure out what you are going to do after smoking weed before you smoke weed. So, draft your prompt and send it before lighting up.

Re: Lines of code got a better publicist

#219

Post by selicos »

sunaurus wrote: post #6

I'm constantly thinking about that Microsoft guy who posted something like "we want 1 million LoC per engineer per month", which basically read as satire to most engineers I talked to, except apparently it was not satire at all, and indeed seemed to reflect the position of many CEOs etc when it comes to LLM code generation. I do think that over the past few months, it feels like the hype around producing unmaintainab…

1000000/25/8/60 = 83+ lines of code per minute.

100000 LOC per month /25 days per month /8 hours per day / 60 minutes per hour

That seems...problematic for anyone doing code reviews.

Re: Lines of code got a better publicist

#220

Post by DrewADesign »

QuercusMax wrote: post #165
DrewADesign wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> how little I know about technology. Probably because you smoked too much weed in school. Remember, this is the tech industry! An abject lack of knowledge is no impediment for people with boundless confidence in their assumptions!

Ya gotta start smoking weed after you're done with school, that's the way to success

Plot twist: they weren’t even enrolled in that school.
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