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LLMs as the new high level language

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Re: LLMs as the new high level language

#51

Post by aryonoco »

beefsack wrote: post #22
dsr_ wrote: post #8

It's not a programming language if you can't read someone else's code, figure out what it does, figure out what they meant, and debug the difference between those things. "I prompted it like this" "I gave it the same prompt, and it came out different" It's not programming. It might be having a pseudo-conversation with a complex system, but it's not programming.

Prompting isn't programming. Prompting is managing.

Interesting how the definition “real programming” keeps changing. I’m pretty sure when the assembler first came, bare metal machine code programmers said “this isn’t programming”. And I can imagine their horror when the compiler came along.

Re: LLMs as the new high level language

#52

Post by hackyhacky »

measurablefunc wrote: post #46
hackyhacky wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You're making several category errors w/ your comparison. I don't think I am. If you ask an LLM for a burger web site, you will get a burger web site. That's the only category that matters.

I think you are b/c you lack actual understanding of how compilers work & what it would mean to compile the same C code w/ two different conformant C compilers & get semantically different results.

> you lack actual understanding of how compilers work

My brother in Christ, please get off your condescending horse. I have written compilers. I know how they work. And also you've apparently never heard of undefined behavior.

The point is that the output is different at the assembly level, but that doesn't matter to the user. Just as output from an LLM but differ from another, but the user doesn't care.

Re: LLMs as the new high level language

#53

Post by measurablefunc »

hackyhacky wrote: post #52
measurablefunc wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you are b/c you lack actual understanding of how compilers work & what it would mean to compile the same C code w/ two different conformant C compilers & get semantically different results.

> you lack actual understanding of how compilers work My brother in Christ, please get off your condescending horse. I have written compilers. I know how they work. And also you've apparently never heard of undefined behavior. The point is that the output is different at the assembly level, but that doesn't matter to the user. Just as output from an LLM but differ from another, but the user doesn't care.

You don't sound like you have written any code at all actually. What you do sound like is someone who is pretending like they know what it means to program which happens a lot on the internet.

Re: LLMs as the new high level language

#54

Post by mjr00 »

toprerules wrote: post #48
mjr00 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And what happens when the AI can't figure it out?

Same situation as when an engineer can't figure something out, they translate the problem into human terms for a product person, and the product person makes a high level decision that allows working around the problem.

Uh that's not what engineers do; do you not have any software development experience, or rather any outside of vibe coding? That would explain your perspective. (for context I am 15+ yr experience former FAANG dev)

I don't meant this to sound inflammatory or anything; it's just that the idea that when a developer encounters a difficult bug they would go ask for help from the product manager of all people is so incredibly outlandish and unrealistic, I can't imagine anyone would think this would happen unless they've never actually worked as a developer.

Re: LLMs as the new high level language

#55

Post by OutOfHere »

The side effect of using LLMs for programming is that no new programming language can now emerge to be popular, that we will be stuck with the existing programming languages forever for broad use. Newer languages will never accumulate enough training data for the LLM to master them. Granted, non-LLM AIs with true neural memory can work around this, as can LLMs with an infinite token frozen+forkable context, but these are not your everyday LLMs.

Re: LLMs as the new high level language

#56

Post by hackyhacky »

mjr00 wrote: post #49
hackyhacky wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You're making several category errors w/ your comparison. I don't think I am. If you ask an LLM for a burger web site, you will get a burger web site. That's the only category that matters.

> I don't think I am. If you ask an LLM for a burger web site, you will get a burger web site. That's the only category that matters. If one burger website generated uses PHP and the other is plain javascript, which completely changes the way the website has to be hosted--this category matters quite a bit, no?

> which completely changes the way the website has to be hosted--this category matters quite a bit, no?

It matters to you because you're a programmer, and you can't imagine how someone could create a program without being a programmer. But it doesn't really matter.

The non-technical user of the LLM won't care if the LLM generates PHP or JS code, because they don't care how it gets hosted. They'll tell the LLM to take care of it, and it will. Or more likely, the user won't even know what the word "hosting" means, they'll simply ask the LLM to make a website and publish it, and the LLM takes care of all the details.

Re: LLMs as the new high level language

#57

Post by hackyhacky »

Retric wrote: post #45
hackyhacky wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Then I gave the same program to GCC again and I got a different result" would be more like it. This is a completely realistic scenario, given variance between compiler output based on optimization level, target architecture, and version. Sure, LLMs are non-deterministic, but that doesn't matter if you never look at the code.

Optimization level, target architecture, etc are just information fed to the compiler. If it’s still nondeterministic with everything kept the same your compiler is broken.

You're missing the point. I'm not saying that compilers are nondeterminitsic or that LLMs are deterministic. I'm saying that it doesn't matter. No one cares about deterministic results except programmers. The non-technical user who will make software in the future just knows that he gets what he asked for.

Re: LLMs as the new high level language

#58

Post by mjr00 »

hackyhacky wrote: post #56
mjr00 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't think I am. If you ask an LLM for a burger web site, you will get a burger web site. That's the only category that matters. If one burger website generated uses PHP and the other is plain javascript, which completely changes the way the website has to be hosted--this category matters quite a bit, no?

> which completely changes the way the website has to be hosted--this category matters quite a bit, no? It matters to you because you're a programmer, and you can't imagine how someone could create a program without being a programmer. But it doesn't really matter. The non-technical user of the LLM won't care if the LLM generates PHP or JS code, because they don't care how it gets hosted. They'll tell the LLM to take…

Is the LLM paying for hosting in this scenario, too? Is the LLM signing up for the new hosting provider that supports PHP after initially deploying to github pages?

Feels like the non-programmer is going to care a little bit about paying for 5 different hosting providers because the LLM decided to generate their burger website in PHP, JavaScript, Python, Ruby and Perl in successive iterations.

Re: LLMs as the new high level language

#59

Post by hackyhacky »

measurablefunc wrote: post #53
hackyhacky wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you lack actual understanding of how compilers work My brother in Christ, please get off your condescending horse. I have written compilers. I know how they work. And also you've apparently never heard of undefined behavior. The point is that the output is different at the assembly level, but that doesn't matter to the user. Just as output from an LLM but differ from another, but the user doesn't care.

You don't sound like you have written any code at all actually. What you do sound like is someone who is pretending like they know what it means to program which happens a lot on the internet.

> You don't sound like you have written any code at all actually

Well, you sound like an ignorant troll who came here to insult people and start fights. Which also happens a lot on the internet.

Take your abrasive ego somewhere else. HN is not for you.

Re: LLMs as the new high level language

#60

Post by measurablefunc »

hackyhacky wrote: post #59
measurablefunc wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't sound like you have written any code at all actually. What you do sound like is someone who is pretending like they know what it means to program which happens a lot on the internet.

> You don't sound like you have written any code at all actually Well, you sound like an ignorant troll who came here to insult people and start fights. Which also happens a lot on the internet. Take your abrasive ego somewhere else. HN is not for you.

I don't care what I sound like to people who front about their programming skills. I'm not here to impress people like you.
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