LLMs are calculating probable text/code. A lot of it in very short time.
Probable text/code is not the same as correct/proper text/code.
It is a huge mass of probable and maybe correct/proper text/code.
That is very dangerous as it looks correct but maybe it is not.
It is likely that the cost of software will increase because of the unmanageable mess that this creates.
Has the cost of building software dropped 90%?
671–680 of 744 posts
Re: Has the cost of building software dropped 90%?
#672> Engineers need to really lean in to the change in my opinion. I tried leaning in. I really tried. I'm not a web developer or game developer (more robotics, embedded systems). I tried vibe coding web apps and games. They were pretty boring. I got frustrated that I couldn't change little things. I remember getting frustrated that my game character kept getting stuck on imaginary walls and kept asking Cursor to fix it…
These posts like the one OP made is why I'm losing my mind. Like, is there truly an agentic way to go 10x or is there some catch? At this point while I'm not thrilled about the idea of just "vibe coding" all the time, I'm fine with facing reality. But I keep having the same experience as you, or rather leaning more on that supercharged Google/SO replacement or just a "can you quickly make this boring func here that d…
It seems to very heavily depend on your exact project and how well it's represented in the training set.
For instance, AI is great at react native bullshit that I can't be bothered with. It absolutely cannot handle embedded development. Particularly if you're not using Arduino framework on an Atmel 328. I'm presently doing bare metal AVR on a new chip and none of the AI agents have a single clue what they're doing. Even when fed with the datasheet and an entire codebase of manually written code for this thing, AI just produces hot wet garbage.
If you're on the 1% happy path AI is great. If you diverge even slightly from the top 10 most common languages and frameworks it's basically useless.
The weird thing is if you go in reverse it works great. I can feed bits of AVR assembly in and the AI can parse it perfectly. Not sure how that works, I suspect it's a fundamentally different type of transformation that these models are really good at
Re: Has the cost of building software dropped 90%?
#673Earlier quoted context omitted.
"Everything is controlled by algorithms" doesnt make any sense - its like saying everything is subject to entropy - well sure but also what?
It's not the same because who controls the algorithms matters here. The algorithms work for some entities and against other entities. They are not neutral at all. They are aligned through shared monetary incentives, so well aligned that they would probably be less aligned if it was a literal conspiracy. TBH. I'm kind of shocked I still have to explain this. When you get on the wrong side of the algorithms you will un…
Do you mean search or recommendation algorithms or something like that?
To me an algorithm is just something used to compute a result based on some rules - but apparently it has some different meaning for you that you just take for granted
Re: Has the cost of building software dropped 90%?
#674Earlier quoted context omitted.
"Everything is controlled by algorithms" doesnt make any sense - its like saying everything is subject to entropy - well sure but also what?
> Everything is controlled by algorithms" doesnt make any sense - its like saying everything is subject to entropy - well sure but also what? Of course it makes sense. You just refuse to cope. This is like thinking that marxism is "rich people bad"
I read your reply a couple of times but no idea what you are trying to say here tbh
Re: Has the cost of building software dropped 90%?
#675Earlier quoted context omitted.
> you've accepted a big drop in quality. Right, but you do it in a 10th of the time.
So you're openly saying you're fine with quantity over quality.... in software engineering? That's fine for a MVP, maybe, but nothing beyond on that IMHO unless they're throw away scripts. "Houston, we have a problem." "Yeah, but we did it in a 10th of the time"
Of course it's fine for any project.
There is exactly one "best" programmer in the world, and at this moment he/she is working on at most one project. Every other project in the world is accepting less than the "best" possible quality. Yes... in software engineering.
As soon as you sat down at the keyboard this morning, your employer accepted a sacrifice in quality for the sake of quantity. So did mine. Because neither one of us is the best. They could have hired someone better but they hired you and they're fine with that. They'd rather have the code you produce today than not have it.
It's the same for an AI. It could produce some code for you, right now, for nearly free. Would you rather have that code or not have it? It depends on the situation, yeah not always but sometimes it's worth having.
Re: Has the cost of building software dropped 90%?
#676Earlier quoted context omitted.
Extensive tailwind training data in the models. Sure there's something more efficient but it's just safer to let the model leverage what it was trained on.
Surely there is an order of magnitude more training data on plain CSS than tailwind, right?
In my experience the LLMs work better with frameworks that have more rigid guidance. Something like Tailwind has a body of examples that work together, language to reason about the behavior needed, higher levels of abstraction (potentially), etc. This seems to be helpful.
The LLMs can certainly use raw CSS and it works well, the challenge is when you need consistent framing across many pages with mounting special cases, and the LLMs may make extrapolate small inconsistencies further. If you stick within a rigid framework, the inconsistencies should be less across a larger project (in theory, at least).
Re: Has the cost of building software dropped 90%?
#677Earlier quoted context omitted.
These posts like the one OP made is why I'm losing my mind. Like, is there truly an agentic way to go 10x or is there some catch? At this point while I'm not thrilled about the idea of just "vibe coding" all the time, I'm fine with facing reality. But I keep having the same experience as you, or rather leaning more on that supercharged Google/SO replacement or just a "can you quickly make this boring func here that d…
does anyone remember that episode of star trek tng where the kid is given a little laser engraver that carves a dolphin from a block of wood? and the kid is like "i didn't make this" and the teacher (who abducted him, ew) is like "yeah but it's what you wanted to make, the tool just guided you" so in 2026 we're going to get in trouble doing code "the old way", the pleasurable way, the way an artist connects with the…
I like your perspective. What do you think "2026: the reconciliation looks like?
Also I need to track down that Star Trek TNG episode... it sounds poignant.
Re: Has the cost of building software dropped 90%?
#678Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Most of software work is maintaining "legacy" code, that is older systems that have been around for a long time and get a lot of use. That's not the definition of legacy. Being there for a long time and getting lots of use is not what makes a legacy project "legacy". Legacy projects are characterized by not being maintained and having little to no test coverage. The term "legacy" means "I'm afraid to touch it becau…
So a project that's still using Java 1.6 and has perfect test coverage and some poor developer is paid to maintain it (but NOT upgrade it!) is not "legacy" in your book? Then we disagree on the definition. "Legacy" projects to me are those that should've went through at least two generational refactorings but haven't because of some unfathomable reason. These are the ones that eventually end up being rewritten from s…
I've predominantly worked in two industries, healthcare/public health and insurance where policies terms are measured in decades. The software for both ranges from 20 to 40 years old, and it hasn't been upgraded because to do so poses an existential risk to either the business or, in the case of healthcare, to human life. Upgrades are measured in terms of human generations because of said risk, but I wouldn't call these systems legacy due to not moving beyond java 1.6.
also, the Hyperion Cantos was a great series.
Re: Has the cost of building software dropped 90%?
#679Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't know why you'd think that. 200 decent unit tests are better than zero unit tests.
The main benefit of writing tests is that is forces the developer to think about what they just wrote and what it is supposed to do. I often will find bugs while writing tests. I've worked on projects with 2,000+ unit tests that are essentially useless, often fail when nothing is wrong, and rarely detect actual bugs. It is absolutely worse than having 0 tests. This is common when developers write tests to satisfy cod…
Look, you tell the LLMs what kind of tests you want and judge the quality before committing.
If you're letting the LLM create useless test that's on you.
I think you're reading these comments in bad faith as if I'm letting the LLM add slop to satisfy a metric.
No, I'm using an LLM to write good tests that I will personally approve as usefull, and other people will review too, before merging into master.
Re: Has the cost of building software dropped 90%?
#680> Engineers need to really lean in to the change in my opinion. I tried leaning in. I really tried. I'm not a web developer or game developer (more robotics, embedded systems). I tried vibe coding web apps and games. They were pretty boring. I got frustrated that I couldn't change little things. I remember getting frustrated that my game character kept getting stuck on imaginary walls and kept asking Cursor to fix it…
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