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I'm OK being left behind, thanks

shkspr.mobi

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Re: I'm OK being left behind, thanks

#571

Post by sarchertech »

layer8 wrote: post #382
kjkjadksj wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well the tech or the language had some feature to it that lead you to using it. By definition LLM coding doesn’t. It is like the job requirement turned into “ask jeff to write all your code and if you don’t we won’t hire you.”

Technologies were imposed by management whether it made sense or not. Like, “all data exchange formats now have to use XML”, or “all applications must be J2EE now”, because it was the new hot thing. “You” weren’t making that choice, management imposed it. That’s the parallel I’m drawing.

That was usually only the case where everyone had to be using it or it didn’t work.

One person hand coding and one person having Claude still results in the same output that is compatible with each other.

This is more like mandating that you use vim. I’ve never some something like that before in 20+ years.

Re: I'm OK being left behind, thanks

#572

Post by abustamam »

gamerdonkey wrote: post #517
abustamam wrote: post #500

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Broadly speaking I agree. But the reality for many SWEs is that if they don't learn new AI tools they'll get let go. It's use AI or be replaced by AI (or, more accurately, be replaced by someone using Ai) for many folks. I think it's a luxury to be able to ignore a trend like AI. crypto was fine to ignore because it didn't really replace anyone, but Ai is a different beast

> It's use AI or be replaced by AI I think they want to sell that perception, but the biggest thing the tech execs want in their SWEs is fear. Fear that makes us stay in our jobs, even when raises and bonuses stagnate, because the market is scary with all the "AI layoffs" (which have largely been regular downsizing with the AI label slapped on). Fear that makes us use the LLMs and then put in extra hours when we don'…

I think you're right that it is fear. But it's kind of a self fulfilling fear. Teams are requiring employees to use AI, probably because of this fear. Maybe it isn't directly taking my job, but it is necessary for me to use Ai to keep my job.

Re: I'm OK being left behind, thanks

#573

Post by ErroneousBosh »

linhns wrote: post #515
ErroneousBosh wrote: post #497

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Is this seriously so? Have you never seen anything helpful from an LLM? No, not at all. I may be using it wrong. I put in "write me a library that decodes network packets in " and it had no idea where to start. What part of it is it supposed to do? I don't want to do any more typing than I have to.

Well, if you ask it to write a library at the start, it's likely it will not do that well. Start small, spoon feed some examples.

So I have to do a lot of typing? Because the typing is the bit I don't want to do.

Actually writing code is the fun and easy bit.

Re: I'm OK being left behind, thanks

#574

Post by sarchertech »

diehunde wrote: post #312
augusto-moura wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I get a bit annoyed is companies forcing AI tools, getting usage metrics and actively hunting the engineers that don't use the tool "enough", I've never seen anything like it for a technically optional tool. Even in the past, aside from technical limitaions, you were not required to use enough of a tool. It just sounds like a giant scheme to burn through tokens and give money to the AI corps, and tech directors…

As an employee of a big tech company doing this, it's all fear mongering. We are being told that if everyone doesn't use these tools, our competitors will wipe the floor with us because they are using them and will ship features 10x faster. But many engineers are suspicious as well.

I’m at a big tech company top and essentially no one is a true believer more than 3 or 4 levels down from the top. We’re all just trying to keep our use metrics high enough to not get noticed.

But for those top layers, I’ve never seen so much FOMO in all my life. We’re a very slow moving company but they act like we’ve got 2 weeks to go “AI first” or we’re dead in the water. I’ve never seen such a successful hype cycle. I’m pretty sure it’s the bots that are accelerating it so far behind a normal hype cycle.

Re: I'm OK being left behind, thanks

#575

Post by kjkjadksj »

bitwize wrote: post #368
kjkjadksj wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Internet is something new. By definition llm coding isn’t doing anything you couldn’t have done already. Once the agents aren’t writing a human syntax based language but are spitting out opaque functions in binary machine code, then they are doing something new and compelling imo because there are real performance gains with that.

No, this is wrong. AI has drastically shortened the time and effort between idea and implementation. The upshot being, that not only do you get things done faster, but things you wouldn't otherwise countenance doing are now within reach.

So where is all the new tech years into ai? Turns out that wasn’t the limiting factor. The limiting factor is still what it was 10,000 years ago in business: accumulating capital to start and finding a fit in the market to last.

Re: I'm OK being left behind, thanks

#577

Post by krackers »

ge96 wrote: post #429
ge96 wrote: post #413

If this is about vibe-coding. I remember when React was the hotness and I was still using jQuery, I didn't learn it immediatley, maybe a couple years later is when I finally started to use React. I believe this delayed my chance in getting a job especially around that time when hiring was good eg. 2016 or so. With vibe-coding it just sucks the joy out of it. I can't feel happy if I can just say "make this" and it com…

It's funny too you'll hear people say they reverse-engineered something (not related to today's post) and you're like "wow that's impressive" but it turns out AI did it.

I mean people use IDA for decompilation instead of reading assembly directly, and that's counted as as valid reverse engineering. Why shouldn't throwing it an LLM count as well? I think reverse engineering is one of the fields where "anything goes", it doesn't matter how you get to the answer as long as you get there.

I do agree that the notion of difficulty needs to be recalibrated though, seemingly impressive RE tasks can now be done trivially with LLMs.

Re: I'm OK being left behind, thanks

#578

Post by sarchertech »

mh- wrote: post #391
jrjeksjd8d wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you care so much? If these are really revolutionary tools that vastly optimize work, why bother forcing people to "try new models and best practices"? If the benefit is there people will use it or get left behind, there's no sense having a mandate that people resentfully try the new tooling. Imagine you had a developer who writes Java using vim. It sounds insane but they are just as productive as everyone else…

> FWIW in the face of these kind of mandates I have been using tokens but ignoring the output. So it's costing my employer money and they have a warped metric of whether the tool is actually useful. What you're actually doing here, from my POV, is incentivizing your employer to use more invasive metrics when they tried to stay hands-off and mandate the absolute bare minimum of "uh, give it a shot and see if you think…

>more invasive metrics

If you have accurate metrics to gauge developer productivity then use them.

But you don’t because if you did you’d be a billionaire.

What you have is metrics that can measure developer busyness. If you use those metrics all you’ll do is run your good devs off and keep the ones who can’t find new jobs.

So you’ll have to do what anyone who manages software teams has always done and trust your line managers to manage your devs.

When it comes to people wasting tokens, most people aren’t gonna to do it with the intent to fuck your metrics. But if you tell people you are measuring something they will find a way in increase that metric whether it results in anything productive or not.

Re: I'm OK being left behind, thanks

#579

Post by jmalicki »

tehjoker wrote: post #442
nightski wrote: post #422

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They measured 16 developers and called it a "study"? That is amusing. Not to mention it was conducted almost a year ago, the tools have already changed dramatically.

So just run a new study this year. I do think the tools have improved, but it should show up empirically. The only people for whom the urgency of "right now" is present is for the C-suite and investor class who are fighting to make sure they survive, but it might also be a crisis of their own making. Don't confuse your identity as a worker with the identity of the capitalist class.

You should be able to just develop software on your cellphone, right?

Do you have an empirical study to support that your employer should buy you a laptop and possibly a monitor or two to help your productivity?

If there's no study, why should we believe it?

It's like "A study found that parachutes were no more effective than empty backpacks at protecting jumpers from aircraft."

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2018/12/22/6790830...

Re: I'm OK being left behind, thanks

#580

Post by sarchertech »

mh- wrote: post #415
skydhash wrote: post #406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is micromanagement. If the job are not being done, the best way is to investigate what current practices are blocking people from doing it (the answer is probably meetings and bad communication). The worst way is to present a tool as a silver bullet for tasks you’re not doing and not accountable for.

Where am I presenting the tool as a silver bullet? You seem to be confusing me with someone else in this thread, or making the mistake of turning this into a polarized conversation of "AI is a panacea" vs "AI is worthless". I engaged in the thread in good faith, and am transparent about what I'm doing and why. I also clarified that part of the job in my org is experimenting with these tools.

Have you ever monitored and encouraged the use of a particular text editor or IDE? If you had an employee whose manager thought was a high performer, but you noticed they used notepad would you encourage that they regularly give vim a try?

The reason we force people to use Jira is because it only works if everyone uses it.

AI doesn’t work like that. If it does enhance productivity 50% then use will spread and the expectations of your line managers will naturally go up and the holdouts won’t be able to keep up.

Or only the exceptional ones will. And in that case why do you care how they do it?

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