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Testing GPT 4's code-writing capabilities with some real world problems

tylerglaiel.substack.com

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Re: Testing GPT 4's code-writing capabilities with some real world problems

#441

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's an interesting case and use of the word efficient. Developer time reduced by 5X CPU time increased by 500x When CPU cycles are cheap it's a logical tradeoff but it still grates against my sensibilities.

5X is a gigantic underestimate of how much developer time has improved. How long would it take a good assembly programmer to implement a CRUD web server connected to a database? Way more than 5x longer what a mediocre Python programmer would need.

an assembly programmer wouldn't write a web server connected to a database, they would implement a tui over tty, and it would be faster.

Re: Testing GPT 4's code-writing capabilities with some real world problems

#443
post #273

I was thinking last night about how my job as a pretty average software engineer is probably going to be taken by GPT* in less than 5 years, and how skilled blue collar jobs like electricians and plumbers and carpenters are probably much safer, since robotics is way behind AI.

You are not far from the truth to be fair. Software development as a career is bound to regress ai or not anyway. The goal is likely to turn it into manufacturing, and to adjust costs accordingly.

Re: Testing GPT 4's code-writing capabilities with some real world problems

#444

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wouldn’t this actually create more demand for programmers? More businesses can exist that have a need for software. To date every advance in programming efficiency has resulted in more tech, not less. Additionally there’s the math behind it. If Company A fires 50% of their staff because AI lets the remaining 50% work at twice the productivity then how will they compete with Company B that keeps their staff and now ge…

Yep, I personally see the cost of doing a start-up going way down for individual developers or even junior developers.

You know, until that AI code breaks and you have no idea what's going on internally.

You know how hard it is to start debugging a project you haven't been onboarded to? Now imagine that every time something has a hiccup.

Re: Testing GPT 4's code-writing capabilities with some real world problems

#445
post #2

So, for a bit of fun, I signed up to GPT-4 thingy plus and I picked a fairly common web application and built it from scratch, only by talking to GPT-4 and copy pasting the code bits. I'm actually taken back by how well it's doing; including providing me some refreshers on stuff I forgot how it should work. I can see it failing at solving complex problems, but like the blog post mentions, most programming isn't new o…

My experience is exactly the same. We are truly going through a singularity moment right now.

The difference with the examples you gave (floppy disks, etc.) is the speed at which it happened.

There was Jan'23, and there was March'23.

Re: Testing GPT 4's code-writing capabilities with some real world problems

#446

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know the shoeshine boy indicator story [1]? That's the vibe I've been getting with ChatGPT lately, I have multiple old high school teachers with 0 computational background who hardly ever spoke about ML before posting regularly on LinkedIn about ChatGPT the last couple months. The part that gets me is they aren't just aimlessly making posts, they're getting involved with webinars targeted at educators in their re…

Teaching is going to be a career affected early by chatgpt because students will use it (are using it) to do assignments. A good teacher doesn't need to know much about machine learning to think about how that will affect his job, he just needs to know his students and have an idea how to work with them given the new tools they have.

Yes for generic 9th grade English or poorly taught science classes it is easy to just use ChatGPT. His class would've been pretty immune to GPT plagiarized assignments though, assuming a serious grader were evaluating them, which one used to at least. Yes GPT could've been used to assist in the writing itself, but that wouldn't disrupt the educational goals achieved by developing the content, which required synthesizing multiple modern scientific papers in a coherent way.

In any event, he isn't concerned at all about students using it for assignments, it's the degree to which he seems to think it can be integrated in his current curriculum that alarms me. I think he is misunderstanding the capabilities and therefore pitching something that doesn't actually make sense.

The other teacher I didn't follow as closely, I just got a kick out of seeing she was now advertising some sort of webinar about ChatGPT filled with buzzwords too.

Also if a teacher is really serious about wanting to plan around what GPT can and can't do to the point they want to be a teaching authority on it, they should be consulting with people in the relevant domain. When I want to use a new tool in the lab I talk with colleagues that have a great deal of relevant experience before I start working it into experiments. I can't imagine starting to give advice to others on the matter when I don't actually know the current nuances.

Re: Testing GPT 4's code-writing capabilities with some real world problems

#447
post #8

In before all the comments about how “most code is trivial” or “most programming is stuff that already exists” or “you’re missing the point look how it’s getting better”. I really am in awe of how much work people seem willing to do to justify this as revolutionary and programmers as infantile, and also why they do that. It’s fascinating. Thinking back to my first job out of college as a solid entry level programmer.…

cope

Re: Testing GPT 4's code-writing capabilities with some real world problems

#448
If you've never worked as a dev/in product, this will not help you. If you have a working understanding of your codebase, as a product person, and can bump your way through writing code and the command line, it WILL help you immensely. Source: I wrote an integration that connects our API to google drive to pass video content (something I could have NEVER done before).

Re: Testing GPT 4's code-writing capabilities with some real world problems

#449

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally I think it's 99% hype. The current iteration and architecture of these systems means they will never be at the level where they can actually replace a programmer. The best they will ever get is barfing up snippets for a programmer (who still needs the industry-specific knowledge to VERIFY the snippets). Additionally, "the rate of increase in capabilities" is very much a false flag. Past performance (especi…

But obviously increasing avg and sr programmer productivity by many x implies many fewer jobs for programmers. That’s the point we’re interested in.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lump_of_labour_fallacy

> In economics, the lump of labour fallacy is the misconception that there is a fixed amount of work—a lump of labour—to be done within an economy which can be distributed to create more or fewer jobs.

Re: Testing GPT 4's code-writing capabilities with some real world problems

#450
post #385

I guess my genuine question is to the people who are saying this is a big deal and it will take our jobs. I am a bit lucky to where at the moment I am working in a "novel" field. Lets say though for the sake of argument that AI does come for SWE jobs. To be honest? I don't know what to do in that case, I have no backup plan, not enough to retire. The country I've lived in for 9 years is still through a work visa (hop…

Check out my comments higher up in the thread (eg https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35197613 ), I really do believe that GPT4+ will be primarily useful as augmenters for capable and dedicated engineers, rather than replacements. It's like a very eager and brilliant junior dev that can solve many problems that you throw at it, but still needs hand-holding, error-checking, and someone who knows how to piece the actu…

What about the junior devs of today ?
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