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Devtools must be open source

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Re: Devtools must be open source

#31

Post by nh23423fefe »

2190asfg wrote: post #12
simonw wrote: post #3

One of the arguments for open source software for end-users has always been the freedom to examine and modify how that software works. The reality for most people - even expert programmers - has been that the freedom is more about being able to lean on other people to do that. Most people can't justify the time commitment needed to read and then modify the code for tools they use very often. I think LLMs have changed…

[flagged]

I wasted time trying to understand sarcasm instead of being given a clear point to read. Bad human.

Re: Devtools must be open source

#32

Post by knighthacker »

I'm not against open source. However, if I were to guess, I think less than 1% of people actually review, let alone modify the open source projects they use. I don't really buy this argument.

I think we're seeing a new modality of openness now with open weights, or being able to modify agents with md files, skills, and so forth.

Re: Devtools must be open source

#33

Post by ivanjermakov »

knighthacker wrote: post #32

I'm not against open source. However, if I were to guess, I think less than 1% of people actually review, let alone modify the open source projects they use. I don't really buy this argument. I think we're seeing a new modality of openness now with open weights, or being able to modify agents with md files, skills, and so forth.

I think it's pretty common in software companies to maintain own custom fork of an open-source tool/library.

Re: Devtools must be open source

#34

Post by crawshaw »

davidw wrote: post #30

It's a bit ironic to talk about key parts of the toolchain being open source while making black-box, closed source LLM's, controlled by external companies an integral part of all of it.

(Author here.) Open models are really quite good now. I still use oai as my daily but I have been very impressed by qwen/glm/k3/etc when I try them. They are clearly my future.

Re: Devtools must be open source

#35

Post by js8 »

Some time ago, there was a comment https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48849015

I deeply disagree with the light vs dark framing. I think the real tension between "hacker languages" and "blub languages" is the expectation to modify the language by it's user.

And this is true for dev tools as well. Hackers prefer modifiable environments (such as Emacs), while corporations prefer standard environments (IDEs) to which programmers will adapt.

(As the saying goes: "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." Might be why Paul Graham preferred founders with non-blub languages after all, nothing to do with Lisp as such.)

But to be able to adapt the environment, one must understand it. Therefore the pull to make it simpler, a set of universal tools, rather than a complicated machine with many features and ease of use through following prescription.

Re: Devtools must be open source

#36

Post by throwatdem12311 »

simonw wrote: post #3

One of the arguments for open source software for end-users has always been the freedom to examine and modify how that software works. The reality for most people - even expert programmers - has been that the freedom is more about being able to lean on other people to do that. Most people can't justify the time commitment needed to read and then modify the code for tools they use very often. I think LLMs have changed…

Then you’re maintaining a stack of patches on top of the upstream until the end of time because the maintainers of the projects don’t want AI slop contributions, but now you depend on these changes for your own use so now you’ve created more work for yourself keeping your own fork up to date.

I used AI to help me make a change to a library I use that ended up being a single line of code. The pull request was refused for having a Claude attribution even though it was a single code change that was syntax only with no change in behavior just to make it compatible with an older version of the language they claimed to support (so I considered this incompatibility a bug).

Ended up figuring out a workaround in our application code instead just so we could use the upstream. Still not really worth the effort for most projects even with AI.

In the era of AI slop being bombarded at you from all sides 24/7 I don’t blame them. Gatekeeping is the only way to maintain a semblance of quality (and sanity). Once you let slop in it accumulates at an insane rate. You need zero tolerance or you will be overwhelmed.

Re: Devtools must be open source

#37

Post by simonw »

not-kinsale-joe wrote: post #20
2190asfg wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

What do you mean by this?

I think they're suggesting that because I blog about AI I get free tokens and don't have a conception of how much they cost?

I currently spend $100/month on OpenAI and $200/month on Anthropic.

(I often get free tokens as part of preview access to models, but I'm not allowed to share any code written by those models online for the duration of the preview. Most of my work is open source, so I can't actually do much with those free tokens!)

Re: Devtools must be open source

#38

Post by pornel »

knighthacker wrote: post #32

I'm not against open source. However, if I were to guess, I think less than 1% of people actually review, let alone modify the open source projects they use. I don't really buy this argument. I think we're seeing a new modality of openness now with open weights, or being able to modify agents with md files, skills, and so forth.

Before LLMs the barrier to modifying software was much higher - in skill and time investment required.

Now we're getting to the point where any user can say "Claude, I don't like that. Please fix" and have it fixed. Configurability/extensibility can work in some cases, but having source code makes it much more powerful.

Re: Devtools must be open source

#39

Post by hgomersall »

simonw wrote: post #3

One of the arguments for open source software for end-users has always been the freedom to examine and modify how that software works. The reality for most people - even expert programmers - has been that the freedom is more about being able to lean on other people to do that. Most people can't justify the time commitment needed to read and then modify the code for tools they use very often. I think LLMs have changed…

Ha, yes! A few times I've had a back and forth with Claude about why software X isn't working as I expected it to, with Claude coming up with more and more ludicrous explanations, and in the end I say, "just go and read the code", and it remembers it can do that and goes and does it and then finds the bug, or the weird UX design or whatever. It's really helpful.

Re: Devtools must be open source

#40

Post by throwaway27448 »

throwatdem12311 wrote: post #36
simonw wrote: post #3

One of the arguments for open source software for end-users has always been the freedom to examine and modify how that software works. The reality for most people - even expert programmers - has been that the freedom is more about being able to lean on other people to do that. Most people can't justify the time commitment needed to read and then modify the code for tools they use very often. I think LLMs have changed…

Then you’re maintaining a stack of patches on top of the upstream until the end of time because the maintainers of the projects don’t want AI slop contributions, but now you depend on these changes for your own use so now you’ve created more work for yourself keeping your own fork up to date. I used AI to help me make a change to a library I use that ended up being a single line of code. The pull request was refused…

> even though it was a single code change that was syntax only with no change in behavior just to make it compatible with an older version of the language they claimed to support

It seems like a great stretch to call this "slop".

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