Earlier quoted context omitted.
Damn... "AI has a very deep understanding of how this code works. Please challenge me on this." this person is something else. Just... wow.
[flagged]
*grifters
Claude’s C Compiler vs. GCC
281–290 of 377 posts
Re: Claude’s C Compiler vs. GCC
#282Earlier quoted context omitted.
This thing has likely all of GCC, clang and any other open source C compiler in its training set. It could have spotted out GCC source code verbatim and matched its performance.
It’s in Rust…
It's an LLM, surely it could read gcc source code and translate it to Rust if it really tried hard enough
Re: Claude’s C Compiler vs. GCC
#283Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm reminded, once again, of the recent "vibe coded" OCaml fiasco[1]. The PR author had zero understanding why their entirely LLM-generated contribution was viewed so suspiciously. The article validates a significant point: it is one thing to have passing tests and be able to produce output that resembles correctness - however it's something entirely different for that output to be good and maintainable . [1] https:/…
I just read that whole thread and I think the author made the mistake of submitting a 13k loc PR, but other than that - while he gets downvoted to hell on every comment - he's actually acting professionally and politely. I wouldn't call this a fiasco, it reads to me more that being able to create huge amounts of code - whether the end result works well or not - breaks the traditional model of open source. Small contr…
simple: search that user.
He's a grifter with many failed venues that recently started flooding big project with useless PRs
everybody should collectively tell him to fuck off
Re: Claude’s C Compiler vs. GCC
#284Earlier quoted context omitted.
> It's not fair to compare them like this! As someone who leans pro in this debate, I don't think I would make that statement. I would say the results are exactly as we expect. Also, a highly verifiable task like this is well suited to LLMs, and I expect within the next ~2 years AI tools will produce a better compiler than gcc.
> and I expect within the next ~2 years AI tools will produce a better compiler than gcc and the "anti" crowd will point to some exotic architecture where it is worse
No, they will point out that the way to make GCC better is not really in the code itself. It's in scientific paper writing and new approaches. Implementation is really not the most work.
Re: Claude’s C Compiler vs. GCC
#285I think this is a great example of both points of view in the ongoing debate. Pro-LLM coding agents: look! a working compiler built in a few hours by an agent! this is amazing! Anti-LLM coding agents: it's not a working compiler, though. And it doesn't matter how few hours it took, because it doesn't work. It's useless. Pro: Sure, but we can get the agent to fix that. Anti: Can you, though? We've seen that the more c…
I'm reminded, once again, of the recent "vibe coded" OCaml fiasco[1]. The PR author had zero understanding why their entirely LLM-generated contribution was viewed so suspiciously. The article validates a significant point: it is one thing to have passing tests and be able to produce output that resembles correctness - however it's something entirely different for that output to be good and maintainable . [1] https:/…
I get infuriated just from reading that, I wish I had as much patience as the maintainers on that project.
Re: Claude’s C Compiler vs. GCC
#286Earlier quoted context omitted.
The Ai legal analysis seemed to be the nail in the coffin. Adding Ai generated comments are IMHO some of the most rude uses of Ai.
Not sure what exactly you're referring to, but legal is a very interesting field to observe, right? I've been wondering about that since quite early in my LLM awareness: A slightly sarcastic (or perhaps not so slightly..) mental model of legal conflict resolution is that much of it boils down to throwing lots of content at the opposing side, claiming that it shows that the represented side is right and creating a tas…
What do you mean "not exactly sure what you are referring to"?
The guy just posted a huge ai slop pr, do you think that's the correct place for "very interesting field observations about legal"?
What else could it refer to than you can't back up copyright ownership questions with "ai said so"??
Re: Claude’s C Compiler vs. GCC
#287Earlier quoted context omitted.
This to me sounds a lot like the SpaceX conversation: - Ohh look it can [write small function / do a small rocket hop] but it can't [ write a compiler / get to orbit]! - Ohh look it can [write a toy compiler / get to orbit] but it can't [compile linux / be reusable] - Ohh look it can [compile linux / get reusable orbital rocket] but it can't [build a compiler that rivals GCC / turn the rockets around fast enough] - T…
> the insane rate of progress Yeah but the speed of progress can never catch the speed of a moving goalpost!
Would you want it to? The further the goal posts are the more progress we are making, and that's good, no? Trying to make it into a religious debate between believers and non-believers is silly. Neither side can predict the future, and, even if they could, winning the debate is not worth anything!
What is interesting is what can do with LLMs today and what we would like them to be able to do tomorrow so we can keep developing them into a good direction. Whether or not you (or I) believe it can do that thing tomorrow is thoroughly uninteresting.
Re: Claude’s C Compiler vs. GCC
#288The time will come (and it's not far off) when LLM agents will be able to RE the program and re-implement it just by pointing to the program's directory.
We'll see how fun that will be for these big corporations.
For example: "Hey, Claude, re-implement Adobe Photoshop in Rust."
Re: Claude’s C Compiler vs. GCC
#289I think this is a great example of both points of view in the ongoing debate. Pro-LLM coding agents: look! a working compiler built in a few hours by an agent! this is amazing! Anti-LLM coding agents: it's not a working compiler, though. And it doesn't matter how few hours it took, because it doesn't work. It's useless. Pro: Sure, but we can get the agent to fix that. Anti: Can you, though? We've seen that the more c…
This is spot on, you can find traces of this conversation in the original thread posted on HN as well, where people are proclaiming "yeah it doesn't work, but still impressive!"
Reminds me so much of the people posting their problems about the tesla cybertruck and ending the post with "still love the truck though"
Re: Claude’s C Compiler vs. GCC
#290My 2 cents: just like Cursor's browser, it seems the AI attempted a really ambitious technical design, generally matching the bells and whistles of a true industrial strength compiler, with SSA optimization passes etc.
However looking at the assembly, it's clear to me the opt passes do not work, an I suspect it contains large amounts of 'dead code' - where the AI decided to bypass non-functioning modules.
If a human expert were to write a compiler not necessarily designed to match GCC, but provide a really good balance of features to complexity, they'd be able to make something much simpler. There are some projects like this (QBE,MIR), which come with nice technical descriptions.
Likewise there was a post about a browser made by a single dude + AI, which was like 20k lines, and worked about as well as Cursor's claimed. It had like 10% of the features, but everything there worked reasonably well.
So while I don't want to make predictions, but it seems for now, the human-in-the-loop method of coding works much better (and cheaper!) than getting AI to generate a million lines of code on its own.