"LLM's Aren't Going to Fundamentally Change Software Development" Says Increasingly Nervous Man For Seventh Time This Year
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Let's talk about LLMs
71–80 of 201 posts
Re: Let's talk about LLMs
#72Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not sure why you are downvoted but I agree. Additionally, perhaps LLMs are just like another higher programming language as the author said, and they still need someone to steer them. I'm sure it was very difficult to program in machine code, but if now (or soon) anyone can just write software using a LLM without any sort of learning it changes everything. LLMs can plan and create something usable from simple instruc…
> I'm sure it was very difficult to program in machine code, but if now (or soon) anyone can just write software using a LLM without any sort of learning it changes everything. LLMs can plan and create something usable from simple instructions or ideas, and they will only get better. Did you read the section "Power to the People?" ? In it, the author dismantles your thesis with powerful, highly plausible arguments.
I read that section but I disagree with it.
1. You don't have to be an LLM expert to get good, consistent results with LLMs.
My best vibe-code process after years of using LLMs is to have Claude Code create a plan file and then cycle it through Codex until Codex finds nothing more to review, then have an agent implement it. This process is trivial yet produces amazing results.
It's solved by better and better harnesses.
2. You don't have to write technical specs. The LLM does that for you. You just tell it "I want the next-tab button to wrap back to the first one" and it generates a technical plan. Natural language is fine.
3. Software that seems to work only to fail down the line in production is already how software works today. With LLMs you can paste the stacktrace or user bug email and it will fix it.
This is why vibe-coding works. Instead of simulating how an app will run in your head looking at its code, you run the app and tell the LLM what isn't working correctly. The app spec is derived iteratively through a UX feedback look.
4. I don't understand TFA's goalposts, but letting people create software that are only interested in the LLM process (rather than the software craftsmanship) would be a huge democratization of software.
Re: Let's talk about LLMs
#73"LLM's Aren't Going to Fundamentally Change Software Development" Says Increasingly Nervous Man For Seventh Time This Year
I didn't get the sense that the author is nervous. What I tend to see are people who are nervous that going all-in on LLM workflows might not have the payoff they are expecting, and are becoming increasingly fanatical as a result. Just one more harness bro. Just one more agentic swarm. Please bro, just one more Claude Max subscription. Please bro.
Complaining about every one off issue with LLM's ignores the bigger picture: they are getting better every month and there is no fundamental reason why they wouldn't surpass humans in coding. Everything else is secondary.
All I would need from an LLM doubter is evidence that at tractable software engineering task LLM's are not improving. The strongest argument against the increasing general capabilities of LLM's are the ARC-AGI tasks, however the creators admit that each generation of LLM's exceed their expectations, and that AGI will be achieved within the decade.
Re: Let's talk about LLMs
#74Even without writing code LLMs are a huge help, analyzing code, doing code reviews, documenting code, etc... Even without writing a line of "code" LLM hugely speed up development and take away the annoying/boring work.
In pretty much every case where I've previously thought "I wish we had a tool for this but I can't get the time funded to make it" I now just get ai to work on the tool in the background and check in on it whenever I have a few minutes of deadtime before / after meetings.
The benefits of the time savings of having progressily better tooling over time add up quickly.
Re: Let's talk about LLMs
#75Its the biggest swindle...
You could fetch some unfinished github repos or download free templates. It’s actually faster than LLMs, still no body would do it.
I don’t start my project with the ecommerce nextjs starter repo. I build it from scratch, because it’s faster...
Re: Let's talk about LLMs
#76> But ultimately, the only situation in which LLMs could meaningfully democratize access to software development is one where they achieve a true silver bullet, by significantly reducing or removing essential difficulty from the software development process.
The author didn't seem to read the Brooks essay for comprehension. There is an entire section about expert systems that foreshadows agents. While there is no singular silver bullet, Brooks explores the most promising techniques to reduce essential complexity that were anticipated in 1986.
> The most powerful contribution of expert systems will surely be to put at the service of the inexperienced programmer the experience and accumulated wisdom of the best programmers. This is no small contribution.
Furthermore, his objection to automatic programming was simply an argument from incredulity, which is an understandable opinion at the time, yet quite vacuous in hindsight.
Re: Let's talk about LLMs
#77Earlier quoted context omitted.
The unfortunate reality is that a lot of software does have hard constraints. And a lot of these constraints are "gatekept" by regulators, compliance policies, insurance companies, etc. If someone slops together a medical record system, and leaks a bunch of PHI, there will be consequences, even in the US. Similarly, good luck getting insurance against cyber attacks without a SOC2 audit or equivalent. I've had this co…
OK, I have no idea who you are, and this isn't personal, I'm responding to a comment and not a person --- but this is an argument that posits that one of the big problems with LLM software is "SOC2 audits". Since SOC2 audits are basically not a meaningful thing, I'm left wondering if the rest of your argument is similarly poorly supported. It feels like a dunk to write that. But I genuinely do think there's so much m…
Since when are SOC audits not a meaningful thing?
Re: Let's talk about LLMs
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
You say this as though performance has not followed a very clear and extremely rapid improvement in a startlingly short amount of time. You’re definitely right that people adopt agentic workflows and are disappointed or worse, but the point is the disappointment has already reduced substantially and will continue to do so. We know this because we know the scaling laws, and also because learning theory has been around…
What rapid improvement has occurred, because in this six month AI coding fever dream we've been living in, I really haven't seen anything new in awhile, both in terms of new ideas for AI coding or in new consumer products or services. I'll give you the coding harnesses themselves are better because that was a new product category with a lot of low-hanging fruit, but have the models actually improved in a way that isn…
Uninformed opinion of someone who clearly doesnt consistently use AI coding tools, clearly. And why are you limiting it to 6 months? Whats wrong with you?
Re: Let's talk about LLMs
#79Earlier quoted context omitted.
To clarify, AI should not do the design itself. You develop the design in conversation with AI. I come in knowing what I need to build and at least one idea or more of how it should be done. I present the problem, constraints, potential solutions, and ask for criticisms and alternatives. I can keep it as broad as possible or I can get more granular like struct layouts, api endpoints, etc. I go back and forth until th…
> It's wildly better at tight and limited scope than large scale changes but even then I would rather code it myself. One thing I would like to see is the use of LLMs for smarter semi-manual editing. While programming I often need to make very similar changes in several places. If the instances are similar enough I can get away with recording a one-off keyboard macro to repeat, but if there are differences that are t…
You should try using the existing agents for your semi-manual editing. You don't need editor support. The coding agent can find "things like this" faster than you can. Just tell it what to look for and how to change it.
What I did was make one commit by hand (involving multiple files), and then told Codex (last year's Codex!) to make the equivalent changes to other instances in the code base.
Re: Let's talk about LLMs
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
OK, I have no idea who you are, and this isn't personal, I'm responding to a comment and not a person --- but this is an argument that posits that one of the big problems with LLM software is "SOC2 audits". Since SOC2 audits are basically not a meaningful thing, I'm left wondering if the rest of your argument is similarly poorly supported. It feels like a dunk to write that. But I genuinely do think there's so much m…
Since when are SOC audits not a meaningful thing?
If soc audits are driving your development process you are doing it backwards. And _certainly_ a time is coming when just using the llm will be soc compliant.