>>> Here's my question: why did the files that you submitted name Mark Shinwell as the author? >>> Beats me. AI decided to do so and I didn't question it. Really sums the whole thing up...
How is it possible to have this little awareness?
AI has a deep understanding of how this code works
201–210 of 329 posts
Re: AI has a deep understanding of how this code works
#202I've closed my share of AI-generated PRs on some OSS repositories I maintain. These contributors seem to jump from one project to another, until their contribution is accepted (recognized ?). I wonder how long the open-source ecosystem will be able to resist this wave. The burden of reviewing AI-generated PRs is already not sustainable for maintainers, and the number of real open-source contributors is decreasing. Si…
I think he’s resume building.
Re: AI has a deep understanding of how this code works
#203https://github.com/ocaml/ocaml/pull/14369/files#diff-bc37d03... Found this part hilarious - git ignoring all of the claude planning MD files that it tends to spit out, and including that in the PR Lazy AI-driven contributions like this are why so many open source maintainers have a negative reaction to any AI-generated code
(keep on disk, don't commit)
Don’t open time wasting PRs full stop and give oss maintainers a break is the better message to take home from this.
Re: AI has a deep understanding of how this code works
#204This guy's resume is quite something to behold: 1) Slummed it through the ranks of various Wall Street banks [1] 2) Became the Director of Prime Brokerage Technology at Deutsche Bank in 1999 [2] 3) Went through venture capital round in 2000 and in 9 months built a company valued at over 1,000,000 USD [0] 4) Sold license to Electronic Arts (EA) to power EA World Series of Poker (WSOP). [3] 5) Wrote, but had to cancel…
The Reddit link is from 18 years ago with people discussing almost the same thing. Damn.
Re: AI has a deep understanding of how this code works
#205Earlier quoted context omitted.
If a manager says they provided oversight of their developer employees, and the code was not as good as the manager thought, would you say "the manager has had their brain broken by the existence of employees"?
I'll bite, let's grant for the sake of the argument that equaling the LLM with a person holds. This manager is directly providing an unrelated team with an unprompted 150-file giant PR dumped at once with no previous discussion. Upon questioning, he says the code has been written by an outside contractor he personally chose. No one has onboarded this contractor to the team, and checking their online presence shows lo…
This was a pretty spot on analogy. In particular “the manager cannot justify this, but doesn't seem bothered by the fact, and insists that the contractors are amazing” is too accurate.
Re: AI has a deep understanding of how this code works
#206Earlier quoted context omitted.
Perhaps because the AI assigned copyright in the files to the author of the library it copied from and the person prompting it told it to look at that library. Without even getting into the comedy AI generated apologia to go with it which makes it look worse rather than better. From a pragmatic viewpoint as an engineer you assign the IP you create over to the company you work for so plagarism has real world potential…
Can you give an example what exactly was copied? I ask because I took a look into MR and original repo, and the conclusion is that the tool only copy-pasted the copyright header but not the code. So I am still wondering - what's wrong with that (it's a silly mistake even a human can make), and where is the copyright infringement everyone is talking about?
> copy-past[ing] the copyright header but not the code [is] a silly mistake even a human can make
Do you mind showing me some examples of that? That seems so implausible to me
Just for reference, here's another example of AI adding phantom contributors and the human just ignoring it or not even noticing: https://github.com/auth0/nextjs-auth0/issues/2432
Re: AI has a deep understanding of how this code works
#207Earlier quoted context omitted.
>You can’t drop a 13k line PR you don’t understand without prior discussion. How common was that before AI coding?
Enough that stacked PRs are a thing. At my job people sometimes build large features on a branch for 6 months. Then it’s a massive PR and no one can review it.
You seem to have answered the question "How common is a 13k line PR?" but that's not what the parent comment asked.
Re: AI has a deep understanding of how this code works
#208Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's a fair answer. How do you stop people from doing it though? How do you stop it from becoming every lazy person's first reflex instead of every smart person's third?
I don’t know. But at least you’ve identified the real problem: lazy people generating trash code. AI isn’t bad, people are.
We have historically intervened socially (via state regulation, taboo, or censure) in areas where the likelihood of misbehavior was high or the result of misbehavior was severe enough.
For example: nuclear material possession or refinement; slavery; consumer-available systemic antibiotics; ozone-damaging coolants; dowries.
Proscriptions on those are imperfect and inconsistent worldwide, but still prevalent. Each of them is a thing which benefited many people but whose practice enabled massive harm due to human failures (like laziness).
Re: AI has a deep understanding of how this code works
#209Earlier quoted context omitted.
Perhaps because the AI assigned copyright in the files to the author of the library it copied from and the person prompting it told it to look at that library. Without even getting into the comedy AI generated apologia to go with it which makes it look worse rather than better. From a pragmatic viewpoint as an engineer you assign the IP you create over to the company you work for so plagarism has real world potential…
Can you give an example what exactly was copied? I ask because I took a look into MR and original repo, and the conclusion is that the tool only copy-pasted the copyright header but not the code. So I am still wondering - what's wrong with that (it's a silly mistake even a human can make), and where is the copyright infringement everyone is talking about?
None of that matters. The header is there, in writing, and discussed in the PR. It is acknowledged by both parties and the author gives a clumsy response for its existence. The PR is simply tainted by this alone, not to mention other pain points.
You may not consider this problematic. But maintainers of this project sure do, given this was one of the immediate concerns of theirs.
Re: AI has a deep understanding of how this code works
#210I'm the author of the PR.
No, I'm not AI or bot, etc. Yes, my resume is genuine and is even more weird than what was listed (see https://joel.id/resume). Oh, and I live in Kyiv.
As for the PR itself, it was a PR stunt that I regret now as the code works and solves a real problem (at least for me!). I'll probably redo it, once I have spare Claude $$$ which I'm using for other projects now (https://joel.id/build-your-dreams/).
My motivation was to use the free $1000 of Claude credits for there greater good, as well as to try to push AI to its limits. It has worked out splendidly so far, my regrettable dumping of that huge PR on OCaml maintainers notwithstanding. For example, I'm having Claude write me a Lisp compiler from scratch, as well as finish a transpiler.
Last but not least, I think AI will write your next compiler and I write about it here https://joel.id/ai-will-write-your-next-compiler/
P.S. I'll try to answer the questions while I'm waiting for my Claude daily limits to reset...