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Developers are attached to tools because tools encode trust

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Re: Developers are attached to tools because tools encode trust

#101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe you should try using Pi [0] if you care a lot about owning your harness and making sure you're in control of what goes into your system prompt and context? [0]: https://pi.dev

Anthropic doesn't allow using subscriptions outside Claude Code.

> Anthropic doesn't allow using subscriptions outside Claude Code.

Perhaps this[0] Pi documentation could help.

0 - https://pi.dev/docs/latest/models#anthropic-messages-compati...

Re: Developers are attached to tools because tools encode trust

#102

This article is a bit rambly so I'll just focus on some things from the beginning: >If your kitchen knife kept changing shape, weight, and edge, you’d have to relearn it every time; that’s a hard tool to build trust in. This concept was betrayed far before agentic tools, with a much earlier concept: Automatic updates. To use one product as an example: When Windows ME and Windows Vista came out, people hated them even…

A big driver of automatic updates in the late 00s and early 10s were people who never updated their OS or browser and were getting compromised left and right. As I recall, one of the earliest widespread users automatic updates was Google with Chrome, which they did because otherwise there was no way to respond to severe 0days and such before huge swathes of users got hit. So I think there's a place for automatic upda…

> A big driver of automatic updates in the late 00s and early 10s were people who never updated their OS or browser and were getting compromised left and right.

I think we would be better off if people worked harder to prevent vulnerabilities before releasing the software.

Re: Developers are attached to tools because tools encode trust

#103

This article is a bit rambly so I'll just focus on some things from the beginning: >If your kitchen knife kept changing shape, weight, and edge, you’d have to relearn it every time; that’s a hard tool to build trust in. This concept was betrayed far before agentic tools, with a much earlier concept: Automatic updates. To use one product as an example: When Windows ME and Windows Vista came out, people hated them even…

> This concept was betrayed far before agentic tools, with a much earlier concept: Automatic updates.

This is a huge complaint for me. I had to disable JetBrains from automatic updates because they wont stop trying to force their horrendous new UI on me, and the "Classic UI" plugin I have to use to keep my IDE working the way I have been used to for the past 15 years is never updated at the same time.

Re: Developers are attached to tools because tools encode trust

#104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A big driver of automatic updates in the late 00s and early 10s were people who never updated their OS or browser and were getting compromised left and right. As I recall, one of the earliest widespread users automatic updates was Google with Chrome, which they did because otherwise there was no way to respond to severe 0days and such before huge swathes of users got hit. So I think there's a place for automatic upda…

> A big driver of automatic updates in the late 00s and early 10s were people who never updated their OS or browser and were getting compromised left and right. I think we would be better off if people worked harder to prevent vulnerabilities before releasing the software.

I won't argue with that, but with how complex web browsers have become, holes are unavoidable regardless of the level of effort put forth to prevent them.

Re: Developers are attached to tools because tools encode trust

#105
post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is exactly what I said to the last company (which is basically shutting down now lol) management - "infinite customizeability" means "zero percent understandability" for a typical suite of software. I literally was told not to narrow down the features too much or the product would be too constrained... well then wtf does it actually _do_ for anyone?

I don't think infinite customizeability is a problem. Poor default configurations are the problem when you build in the ability to customize. The idea is that the user should be able to be productive more or less immediately after installing the software, and then incrementally customize it as they discover they have different needs than the defaults give them. A lot of developers/companies forget the first part, and…

> I don't think infinite customizeability is a problem. Poor default configurations are the problem when you build in the ability to customize.

This is a classic IDE problem. The IDE has a preferred directory layout it wants, and some other build tool you're using has a different directory layout.

Re: Developers are attached to tools because tools encode trust

#106

This article is a bit rambly so I'll just focus on some things from the beginning: >If your kitchen knife kept changing shape, weight, and edge, you’d have to relearn it every time; that’s a hard tool to build trust in. This concept was betrayed far before agentic tools, with a much earlier concept: Automatic updates. To use one product as an example: When Windows ME and Windows Vista came out, people hated them even…

A big driver of automatic updates in the late 00s and early 10s were people who never updated their OS or browser and were getting compromised left and right. As I recall, one of the earliest widespread users automatic updates was Google with Chrome, which they did because otherwise there was no way to respond to severe 0days and such before huge swathes of users got hit. So I think there's a place for automatic upda…

Agree. Security fixes are the killer app for automatic updates. I would argue there are other kinds of fixes that should make the cut: crash bugs, data loss bugs. Maybe even broken features, interaction annoyances, etc. Then it becomes a slippery slope, and the risk/benefit trade-offs are harder to arbitrate.

I don't think "ill-conceived" is giving enough credit. It has been clear to me for a long time that "security" is the justification for pushing the user to update, but the updates themselves are frequently leveraged as a vector for other, less user-friendly, practices.

Re: Developers are attached to tools because tools encode trust

#107

This article is a bit rambly so I'll just focus on some things from the beginning: >If your kitchen knife kept changing shape, weight, and edge, you’d have to relearn it every time; that’s a hard tool to build trust in. This concept was betrayed far before agentic tools, with a much earlier concept: Automatic updates. To use one product as an example: When Windows ME and Windows Vista came out, people hated them even…

> If your kitchen knife kept changing shape, weight, and edge, you’d have to relearn it every time; that’s a hard tool to build trust in.

On the other hand, if you hire a cook, then all you need to know is English (or whatever language they speak).

Even if the cooks keep changing, you can always just tell them "use the knife"

Re: Developers are attached to tools because tools encode trust

#109
post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your view of what constitutes a tool is overly broad. An OS is not a tool. A hand plane is a tool. It’s sharp and does one thing. The stuff an OS does might enable tools, and it may contain many tools, but it is not itself a tool.

A food processor is a kitchen tool even though it does many things. A computer is also a tool that does many things and the OS is arguably the important part of how a user wields that tool.

> A food processor is a kitchen tool even though it does many things.

It does variations of the same thing.

A computer is more of a toolbox than a tool.

Re: Developers are attached to tools because tools encode trust

#110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anthropic doesn't allow using subscriptions outside Claude Code.

> Anthropic doesn't allow using subscriptions outside Claude Code. Perhaps this[0] Pi documentation could help. 0 - https://pi.dev/docs/latest/models#anthropic-messages-compati...

I don't think you got what the parent comment was saying.
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