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Godot will no longer accept AI-authored code contributions

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Re: Godot will no longer accept AI-authored code contributions

#181
post #52
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting initiative. What are the guiding reasons behind these lists? I can't think of a functional reason for a no-AI policy: if it runs, it runs, regardless of who or what made it. Also, even if you avoid AI-generated slop, you can't really avoid the human-generated or human+AI-generated slop that passes your filters. Still, I can definitely think of good non-functional reasons: provenance, accountability, proof…

> I can't think of a functional reason for a no-AI policy Imagine morals.

Maybe then it should be a no Oligarchs policy, and include code written by capitalist shills as well to be internally consistent.

Re: Godot will no longer accept AI-authored code contributions

#182
post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But now with AI, this should be "easier" for some definition of easy. In the sense that in the past, this might have taken 15 minutes to write, now with AI, this can take 5 minutes to write by first getting AI to produce a summary and then using human judgement to make it better. So, it's a good idea now to actually demand the dream.

If people knew how to get AI to write terse, focused summaries, sure, that might help. I haven't seen many that do (well, ignoring the toupee fallacy). Though the most important aspect is that we need to know the motivation and thought process, and all AI can do is fabricate a 'plausible' one.

> If people knew how to get AI to write terse, focused summaries...

... then flooded maintainers would be doing it.

Re: Godot will no longer accept AI-authored code contributions

#184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a "why" a the end of the list https://codeberg.org/brib/slopfree-software-index#why-care-a...

> There is a study showing that doctors who use AI to help detect cancer become less skilled at detecting cancer without AI. Not exactly an argument against using AI, is it? It's a bit like saying that GPS makes people worse at navigating by memory, which is true, but also not a strong argument for going back to paper maps. I feel the discourse is more about "stop using AI" and less about "how can we ensure our backu…

We should keep some people around who can read paper maps (and keep paper maps around too). We need to keep doctors around who can keep working without a computer. It's a civilization threatening issue not to. There might be plenty reasons, from natural disasters, to self-inflicted "geopolitics", when we suddenly have to take a technological step back, and it's in our interest to maintain "30-50 years ago" level of tech possible, so that we don't have to start all over from something resembling a bronze age.

Re: Godot will no longer accept AI-authored code contributions

#185
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you understood the change, writing a short description of the problem and the fix yourself would be trivial.

Efficiency is the key. I haven’t written any issue before so LLM was much quicker than manual experiment. I have personally checked the result before submission. So why the hate? :)

> Efficiency is the key.

... and includes the reviewer efficiency disrespected by your verbose bot.

Re: Godot will no longer accept AI-authored code contributions

#186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"suspects".... that sounds error prone. And I read it like "we don't want AI generated stuff unless we can't tell the difference".

It's their project, they can run it how they like. If they lose out on valid contributions that's their loss. People are never entitled to their contributions getting accepted to someone else's code base.

Sure. My point is that they will probably accept "AI" contributions anyway, without knowing it.

Re: Godot will no longer accept AI-authored code contributions

#187
post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it is hard to verify it, right? If you use rsync clone by an LLM to copy a million files, will you bother to verify every single one was copied correctly?

Well, unless you needed those million copies for whatever reason, that is an example of spam or denial-of-service , regardless of how it's generated. And I'm not disagreeing - it is hard to anticipate what needs verifying, regardless if it's functional or non-functional. But if it's not a spam submission, you could probably design tests or static/dynamic analysis tools that can verify those million copies much faster…

There’s a reason most project don’t have a lot of unit tests. Because a specification, even when fully documented, doesn’t stay static enough to have time to write tests. And if it’s fluid enough, maintaining those tests will hamper velocity.

So you have integration tests that verify the general specs of the software and rely on your skills to verify the finer details. But if you’re using an LLM (and not reviewing every line), you can no longer be confident about those details.

And reviewing every line kills the speed advantage of using LLM.

Re: Godot will no longer accept AI-authored code contributions

#188
post #128

Wouldn't it make much more sense to just reject _low_ quality PR's? On an unrelated note, I lost all respect and eagerness to try it out after the drama.

They want people who will be around to maintain the features as well. There have been several areas of the project that have languished at times because no current maintainer had the capacity or familiarity to move it forward. Also, what drama?

The drama is in a nutshell someone made a really stupid post claiming only the woke use game engines. Godot community manager said guess that makes us woke (paraphrased), conservatives went batshit, got blocked on Twitter or elsewhere for going insane and a few innocent tweets got caught in the crossfire. Someone went off and made a fork of Godot as a 'non-political version' which went in the only obvious direction it could go.

Basically some incredibly stupid highschool level drama fed by the worst YouTubers you can think of. People vaguepost about it because it's so dumb.

Re: Godot will no longer accept AI-authored code contributions

#189

Underlying announcement might be a better link: https://godotengine.org/article/contribution-policy-2026/ I predict this won't last long in any extreme version in any significant open source repo. Banning AI-slop is one thing, but AI as a properly used co-programmer is becoming more and more capable and shutting out well-guided AI will enable competitors who don't to edge and then power ahead. There are obviously pro…

Then those 'competitors' can fork Godot and make their own AI version of it. Will they? No, no they wont. But they sure will complain about the rules while doing nothing about it.

Re: Godot will no longer accept AI-authored code contributions

#190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> allows the reviewer to reject it on the "AI" grounds … but still unfortunately leaves reviewers having to spend time checking submissions and rejecting them.

oh but it'll be very2 helpful and the time spent will be short. It's easy to verify: * new contributor? * more than 10 files affected (higher count are more valid)? * wall of text on description without screenshots, etc? just close the PR as AI, and then the contributor can challenge it if they feel it should not.

A contributor in good faith is going to accept criticism and resubmit an improved change: less files modified, more explanation, more focus, references to actual tickets and discussion with actual developers.
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