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I’m spending months coding the old way

miguelconner.substack.com

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Re: I’m spending months coding the old way

#231

Post by hiroboto »

andersmurphy wrote: post #223
apricot wrote: post #86

I am this very term teaching 18-year-old students 6502 assembly programming using an emulated Apple II Plus. They've had intro to Python, data structures, and OO programming courses using a modern programming environment. Now, they are programming a chip from the seventies using an editor/assembler that was written in 1983 and has a line editor, not a full-screen one. We had a total of 10 hours of class + lab where I…

I've been diving into aarch64 assembly recently building a small Forth. It's honestly really refreshing. If you're prepared to forgo some portability and pick an architecture assembly opens up a lot if options. Things like coroutines, automatic SIMD become easier to implement. It's also got amazing zero cost C FFI (and I'm only half joking). Linux kernel booting into a minimal STC Forth is a lot of fun. Not to mentio…

first time heard about that! thx for sharing

Re: I’m spending months coding the old way

#234

Post by pipes »

apricot wrote: post #86

I am this very term teaching 18-year-old students 6502 assembly programming using an emulated Apple II Plus. They've had intro to Python, data structures, and OO programming courses using a modern programming environment. Now, they are programming a chip from the seventies using an editor/assembler that was written in 1983 and has a line editor, not a full-screen one. We had a total of 10 hours of class + lab where I…

I was going to say "why on earth are you making them use a line editor there is probably a vscode plugin for the assembler with syntax highlighting" then I got to your point about it being in their head instead. This reminds me of what zed Shaw said, for some reason code written without an ide is better and he's not sure why.

As a sort of an adjacent point, I worked through a book that is used on a course often called "from nand to Tetris". It is probably the best thing I've done, in terms of understanding how computers, assemblers and compilers work

https://amzn.eu/d/07pszOEy

Re: I’m spending months coding the old way

#235

Post by latexr »

justapassenger wrote: post #168
bluefirebrand wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't understand this mentality. If I had the time I would much rather never set foot in an airport again. I would drive everywhere. And I would much rather write my own code than pilot an LLM too

You’re describing extremely valid approach for a hobby. Less for a business.

The fact so many people think businesses need to do do do, faster faster faster, now now now, at all costs is a major reason everything sucks, everything is fucked up, everyone is exploited.

Re: I’m spending months coding the old way

#237

Post by orphea »

justapassenger wrote: post #168
bluefirebrand wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't understand this mentality. If I had the time I would much rather never set foot in an airport again. I would drive everywhere. And I would much rather write my own code than pilot an LLM too

You’re describing extremely valid approach for a hobby. Less for a business.

No, they are not. Even ignoring business where using AI would have consequences for you (medical is one example), there are plenty "normal" software companies that value quality over slop.

Re: I’m spending months coding the old way

#238

Post by andersmurphy »

hiroboto wrote: post #231
andersmurphy wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been diving into aarch64 assembly recently building a small Forth. It's honestly really refreshing. If you're prepared to forgo some portability and pick an architecture assembly opens up a lot if options. Things like coroutines, automatic SIMD become easier to implement. It's also got amazing zero cost C FFI (and I'm only half joking). Linux kernel booting into a minimal STC Forth is a lot of fun. Not to mentio…

first time heard about that! thx for sharing

Recommend this series if you want to dabble in assembly/forth:

https://tumbleforth.hardcoded.net/

Re: I’m spending months coding the old way

#239

Post by grebc »

scarface_74 wrote: post #155
grebc wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you’re 50+ as you intimated in your first post then you have a wealth of knowledge that juniors don’t. Just because it worked this time doesn’t mean it always will. If you need further explanation of why you might want to spend more time resolving a bug to learn about the systems you’re tasked with maintaining then I’m at a loss sorry.

And then as experience developer you would have to try one of the other tools in your toolbox. Why should someone tie a hand behind their back and not use an LLM out of some sense of nerd pride?

How do you get the experience if you always just reach for your LLM?

Re: I’m spending months coding the old way

#240

Post by thesz »

raincole wrote: post #184
thesz wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From what I remember, typical new C++ debugged code speed is about 20-25K lines per year, lines that are non-blank, non-comment and not completely verifiable by compiler. E.g., standalone bracket or comma or semicolon are not lines of code, function header is too not a line of code, but computation, conditions and loops are. This is from old IBM statistics, I learned about it circa 2007. If we assume that there are 5…

> I find this amusing. In what way? You're either very young or very old, right? Voice-to-text has been a common way to input text online since iPhone. Someone commented on HN != they typed that many words with their fingers.

I strongly believe you can use voice-to-text for coding.

If the person I replied do use voice-to-text, their mention of carpal syndrome is moot and this is amusing. If they do not use voice-to-text, it is still amusing in the sense of my previous comment.

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