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Claude Sonnet 4 now supports 1M tokens of context

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Re: Claude Sonnet 4 now supports 1M tokens of context

#261

Post by lillecarl »

cambaceres wrote: post #76
benterix wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it's not clear if the value actually exists here. Having spent a couple of weeks on Claude Code recently, I arrived to the conclusion that the net value for me from agentic AI is actually negative. I will give it another run in 6-8 months though.

For me it’s meant a huge increase in productivity, at least 3X. Since so many claim the opposite, I’m curious to what you do more specifically? I guess different roles/technologies benefit more from agents than others. I build full stack web applications in node/.net/react, more importantly (I think) is that I work on a small startup and manage 3 applications myself.

I'm currently unemployed in the DevOps field (resigned and got a long vacation). I've been using various models to write various Kubernetes plug-ins abd simple automation scripts. It's been a godsend implementing things which would require too much research otherwise, my ADHD context window is smaller than Claude's.

Models are VERY good at Kubernetes since they have very anal (good) documentation requirements before merging.

I would say my productivity gain is unmeasurable since I can produce things I'd ADHD out of unless I've got a whip up my rear.

Re: Claude Sonnet 4 now supports 1M tokens of context

#262

Post by theshrike79 »

lukebechtel wrote: post #156
verall wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This week, I used it to write ESP32 firmware and a Linux kernel driver. I'm not meaning to be negative at all, but was this for a toy/hobby or for a commercial project? I find that LLMs do very well on small greenfield toy/hobby projects but basically fall over when brought into commercial projects that often have bespoke requirements and standards (i.e. has to cross compile on qcc, comply with autosar, in-house bu…

Maintaining project documentation is: (1) Easier with AI (2) Critical for letting AI work effectively in your codebase. Try creating well structured rules for working in your codebase, put in .cursorrules or Claude equivalent... let AI help you... see if that helps.

The magic to using agentic LLMs efficiently is...

proper project management.

You need to have good documentation, split into logical bits. Tasks need to be clearly defined and not have extensive dependencies.

And you need to have a simple feedback loop where you can easily run the program and confirm the output matches what you want.

Re: Claude Sonnet 4 now supports 1M tokens of context

#263

Post by unoti »

wiremine wrote: post #130
cambaceres wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me it’s meant a huge increase in productivity, at least 3X. Since so many claim the opposite, I’m curious to what you do more specifically? I guess different roles/technologies benefit more from agents than others. I build full stack web applications in node/.net/react, more importantly (I think) is that I work on a small startup and manage 3 applications myself.

> Having spent a couple of weeks on Claude Code recently, I arrived to the conclusion that the net value for me from agentic AI is actually negative. > For me it’s meant a huge increase in productivity, at least 3X. How do we reconcile these two comments? I think that's a core question of the industry right now. My take, as a CTO, is this: we're giving people new tools, and very little training on the techniques that…

> Having spent a couple of weeks on Claude Code recently, I arrived to the conclusion that the net value for me from agentic AI is actually negative. > For me it’s meant a huge increase in productivity, at least 3X. > How do we reconcile these two comments? I think that's a core question of the industry right now.

Every success story with AI coding involves giving the agent enough context to succeed on a task that it can see a path to success on. And every story where it fails is a situation where it had not enough context to see a path to success on. Think about what happens with a junior software engineer: you give them a task and they either succeed or fail. If they succeed wildly, you give them a more challenging task. If they fail, you give them more guidance, more coaching, and less challenging tasks with more personal intervention from you to break it down into achievable steps.

As models and tooling becomes more advanced, the place where that balance lies shifts. The trick is to ride that sweet spot of task breakdown and guidance and supervision.

Re: Claude Sonnet 4 now supports 1M tokens of context

#264

Post by theshrike79 »

epiccoleman wrote: post #147
artursapek wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can "force" it by just paying them $200 (which is nothing compared to the value)

is Opus that much better than Sonnet? My sub is $20 a month, so I guess I'd have to buy that I'm going to get a 10x boost, which seems dubious

With the $20 plan you get Opus on the web and in the native app. Just not in Claude Code.

IMO it's pretty good for design, but with code it gets in its head a bit too much and overthinks and overcomplicates solutions.

Re: Claude Sonnet 4 now supports 1M tokens of context

#265

Post by chasd00 »

pesfandiar wrote: post #242
wiremine wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Having spent a couple of weeks on Claude Code recently, I arrived to the conclusion that the net value for me from agentic AI is actually negative. > For me it’s meant a huge increase in productivity, at least 3X. How do we reconcile these two comments? I think that's a core question of the industry right now. My take, as a CTO, is this: we're giving people new tools, and very little training on the techniques that…

Your analogy would be much better with giving workers a work horse with a mind of its own. Trucks come with clear instructions and predictable behaviour.

> Your analogy would be much better with giving workers a work horse with a mind of its own.

i think this is a very insightful comment with respect to working with LLMs. If you've ever ridden a horse you don't really tell it to walk, run, turn left, turn right, etc you have to convince it to do those things and not be too aggravating while you're at it. With a truck simple cause and effect applies but with horse it's a negotiation. I feel like working with LLMs is like a negotiation, you have to coax out of it what you're after.

Re: Claude Sonnet 4 now supports 1M tokens of context

#266

Post by jama211 »

chasd00 wrote: post #253
wiremine wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Having spent a couple of weeks on Claude Code recently, I arrived to the conclusion that the net value for me from agentic AI is actually negative. > For me it’s meant a huge increase in productivity, at least 3X. How do we reconcile these two comments? I think that's a core question of the industry right now. My take, as a CTO, is this: we're giving people new tools, and very little training on the techniques that…

One thing to think about is many software devs have a very hard time with code they didn't write. I've seen many devs do a lot of work to change code to something equivalent (even with respect to performance and readability) only because it's not the way they would have done it. I could see people having a hard time using what the LLM produced without having to "fix it up" and basically re-write everything.

Yeah sometimes I feel like a unicorn because I don’t really care about code at all, so long as it conforms to decent standards and does what it needs to do. I honestly believe engineers often overestimate the importance of elegance in code too, to the point of not realising the slow down of a project due to overly perfect code is genuinely not worth it.

Re: Claude Sonnet 4 now supports 1M tokens of context

#267

Post by sixothree »

wiremine wrote: post #130
cambaceres wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me it’s meant a huge increase in productivity, at least 3X. Since so many claim the opposite, I’m curious to what you do more specifically? I guess different roles/technologies benefit more from agents than others. I build full stack web applications in node/.net/react, more importantly (I think) is that I work on a small startup and manage 3 applications myself.

> Having spent a couple of weeks on Claude Code recently, I arrived to the conclusion that the net value for me from agentic AI is actually negative. > For me it’s meant a huge increase in productivity, at least 3X. How do we reconcile these two comments? I think that's a core question of the industry right now. My take, as a CTO, is this: we're giving people new tools, and very little training on the techniques that…

It might just be me but I feel like it excels with certain languages where other situations it falls flat. Throw a well architected and documented code base in a popular language and you can definitely feel it get I to its groove.

Also giving IT tools to ensure success is just as important. MCPs can sometimes make a world of difference, especially when it needs to search you code base.

Re: Claude Sonnet 4 now supports 1M tokens of context

#268

Post by parineum »

wahnfrieden wrote: post #200
parineum wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I did. Not everybody has their own product that might benefit from a $200 subscription. Most of us work for someone else and, unless that person is paying for the subscription, the _value_ it adds is irrelevant unless it results in better compensation. Furthermore, the advice was given to upgrade to a $200 subscription from the $20 subscription. The difference in value that might translate into income between th…

If you are employed you should petition your employer for tools you want. Maybe you can use it to take the day off earlier or spend more time socializing. Or to get a promotion or performance bonus. Hopefully not just to meet rising productivity expectations without being handed the tools needed to achieve that. Having full-time access to these tools can also improve your own skills in using them, to profit from in a…

I'm not disputing that. I'm just pushing back against the casual suggestion (not by you) to just go spend $200.

No doubt that you should ask you employer for the tools you want/need to do your job but plenty of us are using this kind of thing casually and the response to "Any way I can force it to use [Opus] exclusively?" is "Spend $200, it's worth it." isn't really helpful, especially in the context where the poster was clearly looking to try it out to see if it was worth it.

Re: Claude Sonnet 4 now supports 1M tokens of context

#269

Post by [deleted] »

nomel wrote: post #169
oceanplexian wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I work in FAANG, have been for over a decade. These tools are creating a huge amount of value, starting with Copilot but now with tools like Claude Code and Cursor. The people doing so don’t have a lot of time to comment about it on HN since we’re busy building things.

What are the AI usage policies like at your org? Where I am, we’re severely limited.

[deleted]

Re: Claude Sonnet 4 now supports 1M tokens of context

#270

Post by ijidak »

sdesol wrote: post #137
photon_lines wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry -- I keep seeing this being used but I'm not entirely sure how it differs from most of human thinking. Most human 'reasoning' is probabilistic as well and we rely on 'associative' networks to ingest information. In a similar manner - LLMs use association as well -- and not only that, but they are capable of figuring out patterns based on examples (just like humans are) -- read this paper for context: https://ar…

I'm not sure if I would say human reasoning is 'probabilistic' unless you are taking a very far step back and saying based on how the person lived, they have ingrained biases (weights) that dictates how they reason. I don't know if LLMs have a built in scepticism like humans do, that plays a significant role in reasoning. Regardless if you believe LLMs are probabilistic or not, I think what we are both saying is cont…

For me, the way humans finish each other's sentences and often think of quotes from the same movies at the same time in conversation (when there is no clear reason for that quote to be a part of the conversation), indicates that there is a probabilistic element to human thinking.

Is it entirely probabilistic? I don't think so. But, it does seem that a chunk of our speech generation and processing is similar to LLMs. (e.g. given the words I've heard so far, my brain is guessing words x y z should come next.)

I feel like the conscious, executive mind humans have exercises some active control over our underlying probabilistic element. And LLMs lack the conscious executive.

e.g. They have our probabilistic capabilities, without some additional governing layer that humans have.

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