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We put a coding agent in a while loop

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Re: We put a coding agent in a while loop

#261

Post by nsonha »

antihero wrote: post #200
nsonha wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> on its own does it? Did you forget the prompts? MCP is just a protocol for tool/function calling which in turn is part of the prompt, quite an important part actually. Did you think AI works by prompts like "make magic happen" and it... just happens? Anyone who makes dumb arguments like this should not deserve a job in tech.

I’ve literally asked Claude Code to look at and fix an issue on a cluster and it knows to use the cli utils.

Because Claude has that as a built-in tool. Try Claude on web and see how useless AI is without tools.

And don't even get me start with giving AI your entire system in one tool, it's good for toying around only.

Re: We put a coding agent in a while loop

#262

Post by gr8niss »

surajrmal wrote: post #242
VincentEvans wrote: post #12

There will be a a new kind of job for software engineers, sort of like a cross between working with legacy code and toxic site cleanup. Like back in the day being brought in to “just fix” a amalgam of FoxPro-, Excel-, and Access-based ERP that “mostly works” and only “occasionally corrupts all our data” that ambitious sales people put together over last 5 years. But worse - because “ambitious sales people” will no lo…

Does anyone remember the websites that front page and dreamweaver used to generate from its wysiwyg editor? It was a nightmare to modify manually and convinced me to never rely on generated code.

[dead]

Re: We put a coding agent in a while loop

#263

Post by daveidol »

mnky9800n wrote: post #254
VincentEvans wrote: post #12

There will be a a new kind of job for software engineers, sort of like a cross between working with legacy code and toxic site cleanup. Like back in the day being brought in to “just fix” a amalgam of FoxPro-, Excel-, and Access-based ERP that “mostly works” and only “occasionally corrupts all our data” that ambitious sales people put together over last 5 years. But worse - because “ambitious sales people” will no lo…

I met a guy on the airplane the other day whose job is to vibe code for people who can't vibe code. He showed me his discord server (he paid for plane wifi), where he charges people 50$/month to be in the server and he helps them unfuck their vibe coded projects. He had around 1000 people in the server.

So wait is he an actual software engineer doing this as a side hustle? Or like a vibe coder guru that basically only works with AI tools?

Re: We put a coding agent in a while loop

#264

Post by djeastm »

surajrmal wrote: post #242
VincentEvans wrote: post #12

There will be a a new kind of job for software engineers, sort of like a cross between working with legacy code and toxic site cleanup. Like back in the day being brought in to “just fix” a amalgam of FoxPro-, Excel-, and Access-based ERP that “mostly works” and only “occasionally corrupts all our data” that ambitious sales people put together over last 5 years. But worse - because “ambitious sales people” will no lo…

Does anyone remember the websites that front page and dreamweaver used to generate from its wysiwyg editor? It was a nightmare to modify manually and convinced me to never rely on generated code.

I definitely remember that. Got paid $400 for my very first site in the early 00s.

But we also didn't have an AI tool to do the modifying of that bad code. We just had our own limited-capacity-brain, mistake-making, relatively slow-typing selves to depend on.

Re: We put a coding agent in a while loop

#265

Post by tartoran »

thyristan wrote: post #239
sdeframond wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure. How about the tons of products we don't even see? Those that tried to do it right on the first try, then never delivered anything because there were too slow and expensive. Or those that delivered something useless because they did not understand the users' need. If "complaints start pouring in", that means the product is used. This in turns can mean two things: 1/ the product is actually useful despite its fla…

> How about the tons of products we don't even see? Those that tried to do it right on the first try, then never delivered anything because there were too slow and expensive. I would welcome seeing a lesser amount of new crappy products. That dynamic leads to a spiral of ever crappier software: You need to be first, and quicker than your competitors. If you are first, you do have a huge advantage, because there are n…

I agree. Crapware is crapware by design not because there was a good idea but the implementation lacked. We're blessed that poor ideas were bogged down by poor implementation. I'm sure few good things may have slipped through the cracks but it's a small price to pay.

Re: We put a coding agent in a while loop

#266

Post by mnky9800n »

daveidol wrote: post #263
mnky9800n wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I met a guy on the airplane the other day whose job is to vibe code for people who can't vibe code. He showed me his discord server (he paid for plane wifi), where he charges people 50$/month to be in the server and he helps them unfuck their vibe coded projects. He had around 1000 people in the server.

So wait is he an actual software engineer doing this as a side hustle? Or like a vibe coder guru that basically only works with AI tools?

He said he used to be a software dev. Then he started consulting on the side making websites, doing SEO, and he just started doing that fulltime. But then SEO died because of AI (according to him anyways). then he started vibe coding like a year or two ago and saw all these people posting in forums about how everything they made broke and they don't know what to do. So he started helping people for money and it turned into a thing.

I watched him text people and say "set up a lovable account, put in your credit card info then send me the login". Then he would just write some prompts for them on lovable to build their websites for them. Then text them back on discord and be like "done".

He said he had multiple tiers, like 50$/month got you in the discord and he would reply your questions and whatever. but for 500$/month he would do everything you want and just chat with you about what you wanted for your incredible facebook replacement app for whatever. But I mean most of the stuff seemed like it was just some small business trying to figure out a way to use the internet in 2025.

All this gave me anxiety because I'm here as an academic scientist NOT making 50$/month*1000 signups to vibe code for people who can't vibe code when I definitely know how to vibe code at least. Haha. Maybe I should listen to all my startup friends and go work at a startup instead.

Re: We put a coding agent in a while loop

#267

Post by didibus »

That's already what an agent is though.

It's LLM invocation inside a loop where the exit condition is supposed to be some goal for the agent to have met, which you generally provide some heuristic or deterministic criteria so it can assert that the goal is reached or not.

I'm not sure about Claude Code, but with Amazon Q, if you prompt it in a vibe coded way, and give it a goal like that and say to keep going until the goal criteria is met (which could be running tests and passing them, or running a sub-agent that evaluates if the goal is met). Then I've seen it go for like 2 hours before it ended.

Re: We put a coding agent in a while loop

#268

Post by lwhi »

thyristan wrote: post #164
worldsayshi wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The prevailing counter narrative around vibe coding seems to be that "code output isn't the bottle neck, understanding the problem is". But shouldn't that make vibe coding a good tool for the tool belt? Use it to understand the outermost layer of the problem, then throw out the code and write a proper solution.

> [create prototype], then throw out the code and write a proper solution. Problem is, that in everyones' experience, this almost never happens. The prototype is declared "good enough, just needs a few small adjustments", rewrite is declared too expensive, too time-consuming. And crap goes to production.

This is the absolute reality.

I think we'll need to see some major f-ups before this current wave matures.

Re: We put a coding agent in a while loop

#269

Post by jrumbut »

jack_h wrote: post #229
Cthulhu_ wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> and it will be harder to find someone to talk to understand what they were trying to do at the time. This will be the big counter to AI generated tools; at one point they become black boxes and the only thing people can do is to try and fix them or replace them altogether. Of course, in theory, AI tooling will only improve; today's vibe coded software that in some cases generate revenue can be fed into the models o…

> or replace them altogether. Before AI companies were usually very reticent to do a rewrite or major refactoring of software because of the cost but that calculus may change with AI. A lot of physical products have ended up in this space where it's cheaper to buy a new product and throw out the old broken one rather than try and fix it. If AI lowers the cost of creating software then I'm not sure why it wouldn't go…

Every time software has gotten cheaper to create the end result has been we create a lot more software.

There are still so many businesses running on pen and paper or excel spreadsheets or off the shelf software that doesn't do what they need.

Hard to say what the future holds but I'm beginning to see the happy path get closer than it looked a year or two ago.

Of course, on an individual basis it will be possible to end up in a spot where your hard earned skills are no longer in demand in your physical location, but that was always a possibility.

Re: We put a coding agent in a while loop

#270

Post by lwhi »

camgunz wrote: post #207
worldsayshi wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The prevailing counter narrative around vibe coding seems to be that "code output isn't the bottle neck, understanding the problem is". But shouldn't that make vibe coding a good tool for the tool belt? Use it to understand the outermost layer of the problem, then throw out the code and write a proper solution.

Coding is how I build a sufficiently deep understanding of the problem space--there's no separating coding and understanding for me. I acknowledge there's different ways of working (and I imagine this is one of the reasons a lot of people think they get a lot more value out of LLMs than I do), but like, having Cursor crank code out for me actually slows me down. I have to read all the stuff it does so I can coach it…

That thinking and understanding can be done before coding begins, but I think we need to understand the potential implementation layer well in order to spec the product or service in the first place.

My feeling is that software developers will need end up working this type of technical consultant role once LLM dominance has been universally accepted.

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