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After two years of vibecoding, I'm back to writing by hand

atmoio.substack.com

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Re: After two years of vibecoding, I'm back to writing by hand

#341

Post by the_af »

timcobb wrote: post #32
Mashimo wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is Claude through Github Copilot THAT much worse? I know there are differences, but I don't find it to be obstructing my vibe coding.

I haven't tried it since 9-12 months ago. At the time it was really bad and I had a lot more success copy/pasting from web interfaces. Is it better now? Can you agentic code with it? How's the autocomplete?

> Can you agentic code with it?

Yes, definitely. I use it mostly in Agent mode, then switch to Ask mode to ask it questions.

> How's the autocomplete?

It works reasonably well, but I'm less interested in autocomplete.

Re: After two years of vibecoding, I'm back to writing by hand

#342

Post by crystal_revenge »

jasondigitized wrote: post #284
GolDDranks wrote: post #219

I feel like I'm taking crazy pills. The article starts with: > you give it a simple task. You’re impressed. So you give it a large task. You’re even more impressed. That has _never_ been the story for me. I've tried, and I've got some good pointers and hints where to go and what to try, a result of LLM's extensive if shallow reading, but in the sense of concrete problem solving or code/script writing, I'm _always_ di…

I feel like I am taking crazy pills. I am getting code that works from Opus 4.5. It seems like people are living in two separate worlds.

Parent's profile shows that they are an experienced software engineer in multiple areas of software development.

Your own profile says you are a PM whose software skills amount to "Script kiddie at best but love hacking things together."

It seems like the "separate worlds" you are describing is the impression of reviewing the code base from a seasoned engineer vs an amateur. It shouldn't be even a little surprising that your impression of the result is that the code is much better looking than the impression of a more experienced developer.

At least in my experience, learning to quickly read a code base is one of the later skills a software engineer develops. Generally only very experienced engineers can dive into an open source code base to answer questions about how the library works and is used (typically, most engineers need documentation to aid them in this process).

I mean, I've dabbled in home plumbing quite a bit, but if AI instructed me to repair my pipes and I thought it "looked great!" but an experienced plumber's response was "ugh, this doesn't look good to me, lots of issues here" I wouldn't argue there are "two separate worlds".

Re: After two years of vibecoding, I'm back to writing by hand

#343

Post by latexr »

hmaxwell wrote: post #247
dev_l1x_be wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well one way of solving this is to keep giving it simple tasks.

Exactly 100% I read these comments and articles and feel like I am completely disconnected from most people here. Why not use GenAI the way it actually works best: like autocomplete on steroids. You stay the architect, and you have it write code function by function. Don't show up in Claude Code or Codex asking it to "please write me GTA 6 with no mistakes or you go to jail, please." It feels like a lot of people are…

> It feels like a lot of people are using GenAI wrong.

That argument doesn’t fly when the sellers of the technology literally sing at you “there’s no wrong way to prompt”.

https://youtu.be/9bBfYX8X5aU?t=48

Re: After two years of vibecoding, I'm back to writing by hand

#344

Post by the_af »

vincentkriek wrote: post #30
mossTechnician wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

GitHub copilot was released in 2021, and Cursor was released around October 2023[0]. [0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37888477

Github copilot used to only be in line completion. That is not vibe coding.

I wasn't an early adopter of Copilot, but now the VSCode plugin can use Claude models in Agent mode. I've had success with this.

I don't "vibecode" though, if I don't understand what it's doing I don't use it. And of course, like all LLMs, sometimes it goes on a useless tangent and must be reigned in.

Re: After two years of vibecoding, I'm back to writing by hand

#345

Post by GoatInGrey »

recursivedoubts wrote: post #8

AI is incredibly dangerous because it can do the simple things very well, which prevents new programmers from learning the simple things ("Oh, I'll just have AI generate it") which then prevents them from learning the middlin' and harder and meta things at a visceral level. I'm a CS teacher, so this is where I see a huge danger right now and I'm explicit with my students about it: you HAVE to write the code. You CAN'…

"Why think when AI do trick?" is an extremely alluring hole to jump headfirst into. Life is stressful, we're short on time, and we have obligations screaming in our ear like a crying baby. It seems appropriate to slip the ring of power onto your finger to deal with the immediate situation. Once you've put it on once, there is less mental friction to putting it on the next time. Over time, gently, overuse leads to the wearer cognitively deteriorating into a Gollum.

Re: After two years of vibecoding, I'm back to writing by hand

#346

Post by matltc »

jihadjihad wrote: post #34
disgruntledphd2 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> (And the automated test suite will help them confirm that the refactoring worked properly, because naturally you had them construct an automated test suite when they built those original features, right?) I dunno, maybe I have high standards but I generally find that the test suites generated by LLMs are both over and under determined. Over-determined in the sense that some of the tests are focused on implementatio…

In my experience asking the model to construct an automated test suite, with no additional context, is asking for a bad time. You'll see tests for a custom exception class that you (or the LLM) wrote that check that the message argument can be overwritten by the caller, or that a class responds to a certain method, or some other pointless and/or tautological test. If you start with an example file of tests that follo…

Yeah I've seen this too. Bangs out five hundred line unit test file, but half of them are as you describe.

Just writing one line in CLAUDE.md or similar saying "don't test library code; assume it is covered" works.

Half the battle with this stuff is realizing that these agents are VERY literal. The other half is paring down your spec/token usage without sacrificing clarity.

Re: After two years of vibecoding, I'm back to writing by hand

#347

Post by antonvs »

BAM-DevCrew wrote: post #317
antonvs wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Skill comes from experience. It takes a good amount of working with these models to learn how to use them effectively, when to use them, and what to use them for. Otherwise, you end up hitting their limitations over and over and they just seem useless. They're certainly not perfect, but many of the issues that people post about as though they're show-stoppers are easily resolved with the right tools and prompting.

20% tools, 40% prompt, 40% claude.md (agents.md) = 98% success most of the time. A few errors to correct is not the end of the world.

Right. But "prompt" also covers a lot of ground, e.g. planning, tracking tasks, etc. The codex-style frameworks do a good amount of that for you, but it can still make a big difference to structure what you're asking the model to do and let it execute step by step.

A lot of the failures people talk about seem to involve expecting the models to one-shot fairly complex requirements.

Re: After two years of vibecoding, I'm back to writing by hand

#348

Post by arghwhat »

Lerc wrote: post #250
arghwhat wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do appreciate the visual of driving a forklift into the gym. The activity would train something , but it sure wouldn't be your ability to lift.

A version of this does happen with regard to fitness. There are enthusiasts who will spend an absolute fortune to get a bike that is few grams lighter and then use it to ride up hills for the exercise. Presumably a much cheaper bike would mean you could use a smaller hill for the same effect.

From an exercise standpoint, sure, but with sports there is more to it than just maximizing exercise.

If you practice judo you're definitely exercising but the goal is defeating your opponent. When biking or running you're definitely exercising but the goal is going faster or further.

From an an exercise optimization perspective you should be sitting on a spinner with a customized profile, or maybe do some entirely different motion.

If sitting on a carbon fiber bike, shaving off half a second off your multi-hour time, is what brings you joy and motivation then I say screw it to further justification. You do you. Just be mindful of others, as the path you ride isn't your property.

Re: After two years of vibecoding, I'm back to writing by hand

#349

Post by honeycrispy »

JimDabell wrote: post #220
kridsdale1 wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To a describe a thing people had been doing since LLMs became available.

No. That’s why he called it “a new kind of coding”.

"New" doesn't mean it was invented that morning. Things that are a few years old can still be considered "new".

Re: After two years of vibecoding, I'm back to writing by hand

#350

Post by ash_091 »

GoatInGrey wrote: post #345
recursivedoubts wrote: post #8

AI is incredibly dangerous because it can do the simple things very well, which prevents new programmers from learning the simple things ("Oh, I'll just have AI generate it") which then prevents them from learning the middlin' and harder and meta things at a visceral level. I'm a CS teacher, so this is where I see a huge danger right now and I'm explicit with my students about it: you HAVE to write the code. You CAN'…

"Why think when AI do trick?" is an extremely alluring hole to jump headfirst into. Life is stressful, we're short on time, and we have obligations screaming in our ear like a crying baby. It seems appropriate to slip the ring of power onto your finger to deal with the immediate situation. Once you've put it on once, there is less mental friction to putting it on the next time. Over time, gently, overuse leads to the…

> "Why think when AI do trick?"

> grug once again catch grug slowly reaching for club, but grug stay calm

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