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LLMs are eroding my software engineering career and I don't know what to do

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Re: LLMs are eroding my software engineering career and I don't know what to do

#741

Post by jimbokun »

trumpdong wrote: post #221
t34t34r43 wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Posting this under a burner so I don't dox myself: I work in FinTech on a regulated product. We have access to Mythos. Mythos identified part of our codebase that it confidently asserted was not complaint with a particular regulation and we were at grave risk by allowing it to operate the way it was. Except this was not the case, it had of course hallucinated what the regulation actually required (I know this because…

It was my impression that a whole lot of products are only pretending to be compliant, and that it's much more profitable to operate like that.

In the same sense that selling illegal drugs is a very profitable business to be in, until it isn’t.

Re: LLMs are eroding my software engineering career and I don't know what to do

#742

Post by ai_fry_ur_brain »

shruggedatlas wrote: post #727
rfgplk wrote: post #712

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Customers may build the software they need entirely in-house or via prompt-engineer consultants, without the need to buy software tools like today. It could be a very very different world. Already happening. I know of a few places that have gotten such large gains from LLMs that they know have their engineers working on creating homegrown ports of popular services (Docker etc.).

It seems to me that Docker should be far, far down the list on services to recreate in-house with AI.

[flagged]

Re: LLMs are eroding my software engineering career and I don't know what to do

#743

Post by ai_fry_ur_brain »

davnicwil wrote: post #667
p2detar wrote: post #643

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would it stop with just developer layoffs? When software companies rely on LLM providers to run their business, I’d argue we‘ll see a massive bust of these companies around the world - from on-prem products to SaaS. Customers may build the software they need entirely in-house or via prompt-engineer consultants, without the need to buy software tools like today. It could be a very very different world.

This won't happen in most cases because the valuable thing is largely the knowledge encoded in the software, which the buyers of the software don't have and don't want to have since they're focused on their own business. There's also, of course, the not insignificant value in the software itself actually working, being operated, being updated when necessary, all of that. Again just extra hassle no business will want…

Why would I build my own CRM instead of paying 50k a year or whatever? The engineer plus tokens for maintenance will cost you way more than 50k.

These people are delusional and just repeating delusional vibe coder tweets.

Re: LLMs are eroding my software engineering career and I don't know what to do

#744

Post by ai_fry_ur_brain »

dyauspitr wrote: post #693
george_max wrote: post #617

I see many comments saying, "AI can't do X with 80-100% accuracy; therefore our professions are in good hands." While I don't want to sound overly pessimistic, the models are improving at a rapid rate. If asked ~3 years ago where the state of the models are today, it would sound like sci-fi if answered, "the models are creating full MVP apps in ~30 minutes with one prompt". The hurdles the models are facing now, like…

I think we’ll see a lot of layoffs and then the tech industry is going to become more vertically, integrated with product, business analysts and developers all combining into one role. It sucks because there goes one of the highest being roles in America right now that actually employed a lot of people. Ironically, I don’t think tech support is going to be fully replaced by these anytime soon. That’s one place you de…

[flagged]

Re: LLMs are eroding my software engineering career and I don't know what to do

#745

Post by CamperBob2 »

dodu_ wrote: post #658
zkmon wrote: post #269

> I don't know what to do. Ride the wave. You rode it when websites/webapps were the wave. I came into software industry before internet, kept changing my horse. You are never too old to learn new tricks. The new wave create new kind of work and workers. Be one of them. Ride the beast, master the tools. It's the same game again.

[flagged]

"Woah, I cajoled a chatbot into building something I don't understand at all, I'm so good at my job!"

That ship sailed when people started using compilers and stopped learning assembly language.

Re: LLMs are eroding my software engineering career and I don't know what to do

#746

Post by bix6 »

ai_fry_ur_brain wrote: post #743
davnicwil wrote: post #667

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This won't happen in most cases because the valuable thing is largely the knowledge encoded in the software, which the buyers of the software don't have and don't want to have since they're focused on their own business. There's also, of course, the not insignificant value in the software itself actually working, being operated, being updated when necessary, all of that. Again just extra hassle no business will want…

Why would I build my own CRM instead of paying 50k a year or whatever? The engineer plus tokens for maintenance will cost you way more than 50k. These people are delusional and just repeating delusional vibe coder tweets.

Not every business has $50k for a CRM

Re: LLMs are eroding my software engineering career and I don't know what to do

#747

Post by jvanderbot »

mrandish wrote: post #679
george_max wrote: post #617

I see many comments saying, "AI can't do X with 80-100% accuracy; therefore our professions are in good hands." While I don't want to sound overly pessimistic, the models are improving at a rapid rate. If asked ~3 years ago where the state of the models are today, it would sound like sci-fi if answered, "the models are creating full MVP apps in ~30 minutes with one prompt". The hurdles the models are facing now, like…

> the models are improving at a rapid rate. If asked ~3 years ago where the state of the models are today, it would sound like sci-fi Absolutely true, many things will continue to improve in significant ways. However, if we look at the modern history of rapid disruptions driven by technology (a side interest of mine), persistent patterns emerge. Similar to avalanches or flash floods, such periods of very rapid disrup…

This is of course true in general. But the question is not "how with this evolve" but how will we deal with the rapid changes in the industry? I suspect a long term k-shape salary curve, even worse than today, with the lower 80-90pctile salaries bottoming out such that many have to exit the industry to make ends meet. You can laugh and blame them for not saving as much as they should, but that's still a fairly horrifying prospect for most of us.

I think a _lot_ about stock trading a profession vs algorithmic trading. It was brutal - suicides, many pivoting out to doing car dealership-style work. Probably a 1/10 or 1/20 survivor rate every couple years, with almost all of it a very painful five year period.

Re: LLMs are eroding my software engineering career and I don't know what to do

#748

Post by dodu_ »

enraged_camel wrote: post #731
dodu_ wrote: post #658

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

>> Something else builds it, I take credit for it despite not understanding much about about it. How much you understand what was built is entirely up to you. Literally nothing is stopping you, or anyone else, from having the AI walk you through it, or reading the code yourself if you don’t trust the AI.

> Literally nothing is stopping you

What about the threat of unemployment due to not meeting AI usage/output metrics? I've personally found it has effectively coerced me to stop trying to understand pretty much anything, and instead just send out whatever passes basic test to "keep up".

Unless you want to just play bad-faith word games and say that "technically it's still not stopping you" in which case yeah man you got me good job buddy.

Re: LLMs are eroding my software engineering career and I don't know what to do

#749

Post by dodu_ »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #745
dodu_ wrote: post #658

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

"Woah, I cajoled a chatbot into building something I don't understand at all, I'm so good at my job!" That ship sailed when people started using compilers and stopped learning assembly language.

Never really understood this comparison, as it always felt intentionally obtuse to me, but thanks for replying, friend!

Re: LLMs are eroding my software engineering career and I don't know what to do

#750

Post by camdenreslink »

rfgplk wrote: post #712
p2detar wrote: post #643

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would it stop with just developer layoffs? When software companies rely on LLM providers to run their business, I’d argue we‘ll see a massive bust of these companies around the world - from on-prem products to SaaS. Customers may build the software they need entirely in-house or via prompt-engineer consultants, without the need to buy software tools like today. It could be a very very different world.

> Customers may build the software they need entirely in-house or via prompt-engineer consultants, without the need to buy software tools like today. It could be a very very different world. Already happening. I know of a few places that have gotten such large gains from LLMs that they know have their engineers working on creating homegrown ports of popular services (Docker etc.).

Why would you create a homegrown port of Docker? Docker the container software, or Dockerhub the image repository? This is just confusing. If you didn't want to use Docker there is a perfectly good well tested alternative called Podman with wide adoption.
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