24 ms·

SDL bans AI-written commits

132 points by davikr 5mo ago

pelasaco 5mo ago
What’s the point? People will just fork it and improve it with AI anyway. In another hand, it would be an interesting experiment to watch how the original and the fork diverge over time. Especially in terms of security discoveries and feature development.
- arnvald 5mo ago
  Will they? Will someone have enough time, skill and dedication to maintain it? I don’t think using AI will by itself make a big enough difference, it’s still a lot of work to maintain a project
  - pelasaco 5mo ago
    > I don’t think using AI will by itself make a big enough difference, it’s still a lot of work to maintain a project I think you are wrong. The "a lot of work maintaining a project" would be reduced, specially issues investigation, code improvement, security issues detection and fixes. SDL isn't a that relevant project, but "ban AI-written commit" - which reading the issue, sounds more like ban "AI usage" - is counterproductive to project.
    - skydhash 5mo ago
      > SDL isn't a that relevant project, SDL is kinda the king of “I want graphic, but not enough to bring a whole toolkit, or suffer with opengl”. I have a small digital audio player (shangling m0) where the whole interface is built with SDL.
    - spookie 5mo ago
      > SDL isn't a that relevant project Unreal 5 uses SDL to be able to create "windows" in a cross platform manner (specific use case, but not just a thing on Linux [1]). Many others do as well. [1] https://dev.epicgames.com/documentation/unreal-engine/updating-unreal-engine-on-linux-to-sdl3?lang=en-US https://dev.epicgames.com/documentation/unreal-engine/updati...
    - krapp 5mo ago
      >SDL isn't a that relevant project Many, many things use SDL. It's one of those bottom pieces in the Jenga tower of infrastructure dependency[0]. Not maintained by some random person (that would be Sean Barret's STB library) but still, it seems irrelevant only because it's already ubiquitous. [0]https://xkcd.com/2347/ https://xkcd.com/2347/
- signa11 5mo ago
  don't mind if you do 'guv, don't mind at all.
- sph 5mo ago
  Go ahead, we're all still waiting for these "AI-improved" projects to appear. Meanwhile I'll keep using SDL from the official maintainers which have been working on it for decades.
  - pelasaco 5mo ago
    > Meanwhile I'll keep using SDL from the official maintainers which have been working on it for decades. That's just Virtue signaling. "AI-improved" projects like "rewrite $FOO in rust" are popping up everywhere. I dont support it, sqlite3 being rewritten in rust makes me just sad https://turso.tech/blog/introducing-limbo-a-complete-rewrite-of-sqlite-in-rust https://turso.tech/blog/introducing-limbo-a-complete-rewrite..., but this "$PROJECT bans AI" is just ridiculous. Ideally we should try to use it for the good, instead of ban it.
    - xxs 5mo ago
      > "$PROJECT bans AI" is just ridiculous why so? If they don't feel like reviewing code (or ensure copyright compliance) they are free to reject that. If you feel strong about it, go fork and maintain it on your own.
    - orwin 5mo ago
      I think you don't understand how tiring it is to review full-llm code. I think banning it temporarily until people calm down with AI-generated PRs is a very sane solution. If it is still the solution in 3 years, maybe you would have a point then. I only manage 3 'new' hires and I am of the mind of banning AI usage myself despite my heavy usage (the new hires don't level up, that's my main issue now, but the reviewing loops and the shit that got through our reviews are also issues).
      - ratrace 5mo ago
        [dead]
    - LLMCodeAuditor 5mo ago
      I am not sad about rewriting sqlite in Rust because this is the third such attempt I've seen, and just like the other two it looks like this project is totally doomed: https://github.com/tursodatabase/turso/ https://github.com/tursodatabase/turso/ Like, look: https://github.com/tursodatabase/turso/issues/6412 https://github.com/tursodatabase/turso/issues/6412 It's stunning considering this project is advertised as a beta. There are hundreds of bugs like this. It's AI slop that gets worse the more AI is thrown at it. SDL is 100% correct to keep this AI mess as far away from their project as possible.
- nottorp 5mo ago
  > and improve it with AI anyway No. My impression is that most AI PRs aren't made to improve anything, but to inflate the requester's reputation as an "AI" expert. > and feature development There's also this misconception that more features == better...
  - pelasaco 5mo ago
    there is no misconception here. Bug fixes, issue triage and feature implementation reduced time is a thing.
    - nottorp 5mo ago
      The misconception is that new features are always necessary, not that it would be nice if they were done faster.
- raincole 5mo ago
  I'm pretty pro-AI, but I find it very amusing that every single time an open source project enacts no-AI policy, someone will chime in and explain how it will be outcompeted by the yes-AI version, while in reality it never happens.
  - pelasaco 5mo ago
    > while in reality it never happens. it never happens in 3 weeks? The AI revolution is just starting.. too soon to jump in conclusions, i guess?
    - skydhash 5mo ago
      Make it to 2 or more years. That’s the amount of times that I’ve been seeing comments equating not using AI with hopelessly doomed project/career.
      - pelasaco 5mo ago
        I am sure you noticed how fast the things started to change since the beginning of 2026 right? In terms of tooling, model, context, pricing, etc?
        thunderfork 5mo ago
        This is also something we've all been hearing for ages. "<Model version>/MCP/agents/yadda yadda are totally like anything that's come before!"
        pelasaco 5mo ago
        > "<Model version>/MCP/agents/yadda yadda are totally like anything that's come before!" and they are right. We never saw that before. That's why we all fear it.
        ethin 5mo ago
- ChrisRR 5mo ago
  If people want to fork at and work in their own manner then that's fine, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't protect the project that you're personally working on
sscaryterry 5mo ago
Stopping a flood with a tissue.
- sscaryterry 5mo ago
  Don't understand the down vote. Policies like these are not truly enforceable. There are many many unscrupulous humans out there, that are more than willing to make any code they submit, look like a human wrote it, even though an LLM created it.
  - duskdozer 5mo ago
    Maybe, but the fact that a restaurant owner probably can't enforce a rule for the waiters not to spit in the food isn't an argument that they should say it's ok to spit in the food.
  - cwillu 5mo ago
    Illusion of transparency: you think your analogy was clear, other people found it opaque and dismissive, and expended what they considered to be a similar level of effort to engage with it as was used in creating it.
    - sscaryterry 5mo ago
      Wow, slow clap.
  - thunderfork 5mo ago
    The purpose of rules is not limited to enforcement. This seems to be a common misconception in these threads.
juped 5mo ago
While this is a perfectly fine policy in the space of possible policies (it's probably what I'd pick, for what it's worth) the arguments being given for it leave a bad taste in my mouth.
- or_am_i 5mo ago
  Same. Plenty of perfectly valid reasons to outright ban generated PRs, but "Look, I asked ChatGPT to generate a PR which would break SDL, and it did not bother reading AGENTS.md" is a pretty weak take - gotta know thy enemy a little bit better than that.
  - duskdozer 5mo ago
    That seemed like just a curiosity after they already decided on the policy.
  - raincole 5mo ago
    It's not the argument the maintainer gives. I unironically suggest at least use AI to summarize that thread if you don't bother reading it before commenting.
reactordev 5mo ago
People who can wield AI properly have no use for SDL at all. It’s a library for humans to figure out platform code. AI has no such limitations.
- fhd2 5mo ago
  So AI generated code doesn't benefit from stable foundations maintained by third parties? Fascinating take I don't currently agree with. Whether it's AI or hand written, using solid pre-existing components and having as little custom code as possible is my personal approach to keep things maintainable.
- LLMCodeAuditor 5mo ago
  “Claude, please purchase a few USB steering wheel controllers from Amazon and make sure they work properly with our custom game engine. Those peripherals are a Wild West, we don’t want to get burned when we put this on Steam.” >> ………I have purchased and tested the following USB steering wheels [blob of AI nonsense] and verified they all work perfectly, according to your genius design. “Wow, that was fast! It would take a stoopid human 48 hours just to receive the shipment.” [I would think Claude would recommend using SDL instead of running some janky homespun thing]
  - reactordev 5mo ago
    HID and XInput, you don’t need SDL for Steering Wheels.
    - thunderfork 5mo ago
      Xinput is a pretty constrained interface that plenty of novel controllers, including steering wheels, don't/can't adhere to. Good luck getting the PS5 controller's fancy rumble working over xinput, for example
    - jhasse 5mo ago
      You absolutely do need SDL, it's full of knowledge by humans from trial and error over years of using input devices in the real world.
spicyusername 5mo ago
On the one hand open source projects are going to be overrun with AI code that no one reviewed. On the other hand, code produced with AI and reviewed by humans can be perfectly good, maintainable, and indistinguishable from regular old code. So many processes are no longer sufficient to manage a world where thousands of lines of working code are easy to conjure out of thin air. Already strained open source review processes are definitely one. I get wanting to blanket reject AI generated code, but the reality is that no one's going to be able to tell what's what in many cases. Something like a more thorough review process for onboarding trusted contributors, or some other method of cutting down on the volume of review, is probably going to be needed.
- bheadmaster 5mo ago
  > On the other hand, code produced with AI and reviewed by humans can be perfectly good and indistinguishable from regular old code. Obligatory xkcd: https://xkcd.com/810/ https://xkcd.com/810/
- bakugo 5mo ago
  > On the other hand, code produced with AI and reviewed by humans can be perfectly good, maintainable, and indistinguishable from regular old code. I have yet to see a single example of this. The way you make AI generated code good and maintainable is by rewriting it yourself.
  - llmssuck 5mo ago
    I know it's unpopular to say (here), but I see it all the time. Myself I sometimes cannot recognize what I wrote and what the agent wrote. It's just that I often have a physical memory of typing it, but that's it. (I also saw a lot of garbage, to be fair.) There is quite a bit of skill to it, however. You cannot just take an AI from blank to "good code" without doing work. Yes, it takes work and quite a bit of it. By this I mean you have to write a good code style guide and a proper explanation of your architectural style(s), your preferences, your goals, plenty of examples, etc. Proper thought has to be put into this. If you come across bad code, you need to investigate not castigate: why did this happen? How can we prevent this in the future? Those sort of processes need to become second nature. They actually should be already, because it's not that much different from managing a bunch of humans. Humans come with lots of implicit knowledge and you also select them to match your company's style when you're hiring them. When they sit down at their keyboards you (and society) has already guided them towards a desirable path. (And even then they often still misfire.) AI agents operate different. Their range of expression is completely alien to us. We cannot be both von Neumanns and complete morons. LLMs have no problem there. It takes a good while to get used to that.
ramon156 5mo ago
> Given that the source of code generated by AI is unknown, we can't accept it under the Zlib license. So what about SO code snippets? I'm not here to make a stance for AI, but this thread is leaning towards biased. Address the elephant, LLM-assisted PR's have a chance of being lower quality. People are not obligated to review their code. Doing this manually, you are more inclined to review what you're submitting. I don't get why these conversations always target their opinion, not the facts. I totally agree about the ethicality, the fact it's bound to get monopolized (unless GLM becomes SOTA soon), and is harming the environment. That's my opinion though, and shouldn't interfere with what others do. I don't scoff at people eating meat, let them be. The issue is real, the solution is not.
- missingdays 5mo ago
  > I don't scoff at people eating meat, let them be. Why not let the animals be?
  - crackez 5mo ago
    I'm just happy to be on the food chain at all...
- johndough 5mo ago
  > So what about SO code snippets? StackOverflow snippets are mostly licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 or 4.0, so I'd wager that they are not allowed, either. The SDL source code makes a few references to stackoverflow.com, but the only place I could find an exact copy was where the author explicitly licensed the code under a more permissive license: https://github.com/libsdl-org/SDL/blob/5bda0ccfb06ea56c1f15a304927f2438c1300f95/src/video/SDL_blit_slow.c#L385 https://github.com/libsdl-org/SDL/blob/5bda0ccfb06ea56c1f15a...
  - Sharlin 5mo ago
    Most SO snippets likely aren't unique or creative enough to count as works. If a hundred programmers would write essentially the same snippet to solve a problem, it's not copyrightable.
throw5 5mo ago
Why are these projects still on Github? Isn't it better to move away from Github than go through all this shenanigans? This AI slopam nonsense isn't going to stop. Github is no longer the "social network" for software dev. It's just a vehicle to shove more and more Copilot stuff. The userbase is also changing. There are vast numbers of new users on Github who have no desire to learn the architecture or culture of the project they are contributing to. They just spin up their favorite LLM and make a PR out of whatever slop comes out. At this point why not move to something like Codeberg? It's based in Europe. It's run by a non-profit. Good chance it won't suffer from the same fate a greedy corporate owned platform would suffer?
- embedding-shape 5mo ago
  > Why are these projects still on Github? At this point, projects are already on GitHub due to inertia, or they're chasing vanity-metrics together with all the other people on GitHub chasing vanity-metrics. Since the advent of the "README-profiles" many started using with badges/metrics, it been painfully obvious how large this group of people are, where everything is about getting more stars, merging more PRs and having more visits to your website, rather than the code and project itself. These same people put their project on GitHub because the "value" they want is quite literally "GitHub Stars" and try to find more followers. It's basically a platform they hope will help them get discovered via. Besides Codeberg, hosting your own git server (via Forgejo or Gitea) is relatively easy and let you do so how private/public you want.
  - duskdozer 5mo ago
    >Besides Codeberg, hosting your own git server (via Forgejo or Gitea) is relatively easy and let you do so how private/public you want. As I've seen it, there's a lot of git=GitHub going on. It wasn't even clear to me for a while that you didn't even need a "git server" and could just use a filepath or ssh location for example.
- anymouse123456 5mo ago
  > There are vast numbers of new users on Github who have no desire to learn the architecture or culture of the project they are contributing to. The Eternal September eventually comes for us all.
sph 5mo ago
Good move, and a good reminder of how much of an echo chamber Hacker News is on AI matters. In here, and big tech at large, it's touted like the unavoidable future that either you adapt or you die. LLMs are always a few months away from the (u|dys)topia of never having to write code ever again. Elsewhere, especially in fields where craft and artistry are valued (i.e. game development), AI is synonym of wanting to cut corners, poor quality, and to put it simply, slop. Sure, we're now inundated from people with a Claude subscription and a dream hoping to create the next Minecraft, but no one is taking them seriously. They're not making the game forum front pages, that's for sure. Personally, I have made my existential worries a little better by pivoting away from big tech where the only metric is line of code committed per day, and moving towards those fields where human craftsmanship is still king.
- tkel 5mo ago
  Curious , what have you pivoted towards? A different field?
  - sph 5mo ago
    Game development, and writing small tools in the game dev space. This week I've been working on an image editing app, mostly to play with dithering algorithms and palettes, using Odin and SDL. I mean, it's either that or I quit software development completely; it would be a shame to throw away two decades of experience in the field.
    - ryandvm 5mo ago
      I don't know. For as long as I can remember, game dev has had the reputation of being the most sweat-shoppish of all the software engineering disciplines. I have a hard time believing that game devs aren't also going to find themselves being crushed under the CTO imperative to "use AI or else" like the rest of us.
      - sph 5mo ago
        Ok I should’ve said indie/solo game dev
democracy 5mo ago
tbh if the change works and the code is ok who cares what was used to build it? ChatGPT or C++ code generator. If the code looks crap - reject PR, why drama?
- Sharlin 5mo ago
  From a less self-centered viewpoint there are plenty of reasons to be critical of LLMs and their use.
- tapoxi 5mo ago
  In the Monkey Selfie case - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monkey_selfie_copyright_dispute https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monkey_selfie_copyright_disput... - courts decided that copyright requires a human author and a human merely setting the conditions for a copyrighted work to appear is not enough. This reasonably means AI contributions where a human has guided the AI are not subject to copyright, and thus can't be supported by a project's license.
  - dtech 5mo ago
    That's quite a stretch, and untested in court. At least a monkey is an unambiguous autonomous entity. A LLM is a - heck of a complicated - piece of software, and could very well be ruled a tool like any other
    - tapoxi 5mo ago
      I mean, aren't we all bragging about autonomous agents doing the coding for us? I don't see how that's remotely a stretch. The legal question was "did a human author the work"?
    - redwall_hp 5mo ago
      Tested all the way up to the Supreme Court, who declined to hear an appeal, so the precedent stands in the context of AI output. https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/us-supreme-court-declines-hear-dispute-over-copyrights-ai-generated-material-2026-03-02/ https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/us-supreme-court-de... It's still early, but this is absolutely going to be precedent used in a software related case, and it's going to lead to fun times with SOX/PCI style compliance issues, where developers will have to attest that merges did not use AI so compliance can ensure repos don't pass a threshold where there's too much LLM code.
ecopoesis 5mo ago
What’s next? Are they going to forbid the use of Intellisrnse? Maybe IDEs in general? Why not just specify all contributions must be written with a steady hand and a strong magnet.
- throwawayqqq11 5mo ago
  > Whats next To show you your hyperbole: Allowing monkeys on typewriters. LLMs are neither IDEs nor random. I am very sceptical about iterative AI deployment too. People pretend the success threshold is vibing somethging that gets widely used, but its more than that. These one-shot solutions are not project maintenance. Answer yourself this one, could LLMs do what the linux kernel cummunity did over the same time span? This would be a good measure of success and if so, a strong argument to allow generated contributions.
- askI12 5mo ago
  What's next? Forbid cribbing from your neighbor in an exam? The audacity! They simply don't want people like you and lose nothing.
- grg0 5mo ago
  Visual Studio programmer spotted. They're going to force you to use vim. Better start learning those key bindings as soon as possible.
ratrace 5mo ago
[dead]
manoDev 5mo ago
We’ll need “Organic software” seal of approval soon.
- whateveracct 5mo ago
  "is this library natty?"
- registeredcorn 5mo ago
  Not really. The opposite is far, far more desirable in my eyes. Example: * Do I care if an LLM was used to determine the volume of my doorbell? Not particularly. * Do I care if an LLM was used to generate code to unlock my front door remotely? Absolutely! I need a warning label cautioning me of the risks associated with generative materials. I don't care in the slightest when it isn't present, because the inherent risks associated are inherently lesser. Batteries, not chicken breasts.
  - aspenmartin 5mo ago
    You sure the door lock companies are hiring the best and brightest engineers? Not clear to me an LLM is not attractive in that scenario.
    - djhn 5mo ago
      My mistrust of digital locks isn’t based on negligence from the reputable(?) manufacturers (Abloy? Reputation is in the eye of the beholder). It’s who else has access: property and facility management, maintenance, etc. In the age of physical keys, I trusted these SMBs to be relatively capable, let’s say 7/10, in protecting those keys from most local would-be criminals and opportunists. That goes down to 2/10 for protecting digital assets, like remote unlock capabilities, from cybercrime. As soon as there is a viable market connecting cybercriminals with local criminals, whether it’s vertically integrated organised crime or something like carding forums, physical access exploitation is bound to become a problem.
    - deleted 5mo ago
      [deleted]
luxuryballs 5mo ago
I don’t use public repos very often but I had toyed with the idea of just creating a git user specifically for an agent to use for this purpose so it would not be my user account, is this not standard practice already? Kinda seems obvious to me, I mean so people can tell which parts of my public project were commits managed by an agent.
- jmalicki 5mo ago
  I do this so that AI can only have limited GitHub permissions. It can't merge, doesn't have admin rights, etc. This after I started catching it commit directly to upstream main without PRs among other things.
  - em-bee 5mo ago
    that makes a lot of sense. unfortunately github doesn't allow multiple accounts per person. at least it didn't last time i checked. i hope they change their policy for AI agents though.
    - jmalicki 5mo ago
      It does! "You must be a human to create an Account. Accounts registered by "bots" or other automated methods are not permitted. We do permit machine accounts: A machine account is an Account set up by an individual human who accepts the Terms on behalf of the Account, provides a valid email address, and is responsible for its actions. A machine account is used exclusively for performing automated tasks. Multiple users may direct the actions of a machine account, but the owner of the Account is ultimately responsible for the machine's actions. You may maintain no more than one free machine account in addition to your free Personal Account. One person or legal entity may maintain no more than one free Account (if you choose to control a machine account as well, that's fine, but it can only be used for running a machine)." https://docs.github.com/en/site-policy/github-terms/github-terms-of-service https://docs.github.com/en/site-policy/github-terms/github-t...
      - 5mo ago
skybrian 5mo ago
Since using AI costs money, some way of contributing AI patches when asked might make sense here? Let the project maintainers decide what’s worth attempting to solve with AI. Suppose there were a website that helped would-be contributors of AI assistance to match up with projects that want help?
level09 5mo ago
I would judge commits by what it does not by who wrote it.
- em-bee 5mo ago
  you judge commits by a junior developer that you don't know well the same as commits by an experienced colleague that you have been working with for years the same? your AI coder is worse than a junior developer, because junior devs may write bad code but generally they won't write code that they don't understand. AI on the other hand has no clue what it is writing.
SuperV1234 5mo ago
Incredibly dumb and nonenforceable policy. What matters is human review and correctness. You're never going to be able to prove that a contributor didn't ask an LLM to help them make some changes, or review/optimize changes that were made. Capable people who like to get stuff done will use LLMs, review their work carefully, and never disclose it. And you'll never be able to tell. People who generated slop PRs won't even read your policy before submitting a slop PR.
- em-bee 5mo ago
  if a commit is so good that i can't tell, well, ok. if the committer hides that they used AI, same. the policy allows me to reject the things i know are done with AI and it allows me to punish (ban) devs who lie to me when i find out. without a policy i have no argument.

132 points by davikr 5mo ago

What’s the point? People will just fork it and improve it with AI anyway. In another hand, it would be an interesting experiment to watch how the original and the fork diverge over time. Especially in terms of security discoveries and feature development.

arnvald 5mo ago
Will they? Will someone have enough time, skill and dedication to maintain it? I don’t think using AI will by itself make a big enough difference, it’s still a lot of work to maintain a project
- pelasaco 5mo ago
  > I don’t think using AI will by itself make a big enough difference, it’s still a lot of work to maintain a project I think you are wrong. The "a lot of work maintaining a project" would be reduced, specially issues investigation, code improvement, security issues detection and fixes. SDL isn't a that relevant project, but "ban AI-written commit" - which reading the issue, sounds more like ban "AI usage" - is counterproductive to project.
  - skydhash 5mo ago
    > SDL isn't a that relevant project, SDL is kinda the king of “I want graphic, but not enough to bring a whole toolkit, or suffer with opengl”. I have a small digital audio player (shangling m0) where the whole interface is built with SDL.
  - spookie 5mo ago
    > SDL isn't a that relevant project Unreal 5 uses SDL to be able to create "windows" in a cross platform manner (specific use case, but not just a thing on Linux [1]). Many others do as well. [1] https://dev.epicgames.com/documentation/unreal-engine/updating-unreal-engine-on-linux-to-sdl3?lang=en-US https://dev.epicgames.com/documentation/unreal-engine/updati...
  - krapp 5mo ago
    >SDL isn't a that relevant project Many, many things use SDL. It's one of those bottom pieces in the Jenga tower of infrastructure dependency[0]. Not maintained by some random person (that would be Sean Barret's STB library) but still, it seems irrelevant only because it's already ubiquitous. [0]https://xkcd.com/2347/ https://xkcd.com/2347/
signa11 5mo ago
don't mind if you do 'guv, don't mind at all.
sph 5mo ago
Go ahead, we're all still waiting for these "AI-improved" projects to appear. Meanwhile I'll keep using SDL from the official maintainers which have been working on it for decades.
- pelasaco 5mo ago
  > Meanwhile I'll keep using SDL from the official maintainers which have been working on it for decades. That's just Virtue signaling. "AI-improved" projects like "rewrite $FOO in rust" are popping up everywhere. I dont support it, sqlite3 being rewritten in rust makes me just sad https://turso.tech/blog/introducing-limbo-a-complete-rewrite-of-sqlite-in-rust https://turso.tech/blog/introducing-limbo-a-complete-rewrite..., but this "$PROJECT bans AI" is just ridiculous. Ideally we should try to use it for the good, instead of ban it.
  - xxs 5mo ago
    > "$PROJECT bans AI" is just ridiculous why so? If they don't feel like reviewing code (or ensure copyright compliance) they are free to reject that. If you feel strong about it, go fork and maintain it on your own.
  - orwin 5mo ago
    I think you don't understand how tiring it is to review full-llm code. I think banning it temporarily until people calm down with AI-generated PRs is a very sane solution. If it is still the solution in 3 years, maybe you would have a point then. I only manage 3 'new' hires and I am of the mind of banning AI usage myself despite my heavy usage (the new hires don't level up, that's my main issue now, but the reviewing loops and the shit that got through our reviews are also issues).
    - ratrace 5mo ago
      [dead]
  - LLMCodeAuditor 5mo ago
    I am not sad about rewriting sqlite in Rust because this is the third such attempt I've seen, and just like the other two it looks like this project is totally doomed: https://github.com/tursodatabase/turso/ https://github.com/tursodatabase/turso/ Like, look: https://github.com/tursodatabase/turso/issues/6412 https://github.com/tursodatabase/turso/issues/6412 It's stunning considering this project is advertised as a beta. There are hundreds of bugs like this. It's AI slop that gets worse the more AI is thrown at it. SDL is 100% correct to keep this AI mess as far away from their project as possible.
nottorp 5mo ago
> and improve it with AI anyway No. My impression is that most AI PRs aren't made to improve anything, but to inflate the requester's reputation as an "AI" expert. > and feature development There's also this misconception that more features == better...
- pelasaco 5mo ago
  there is no misconception here. Bug fixes, issue triage and feature implementation reduced time is a thing.
  - nottorp 5mo ago
    The misconception is that new features are always necessary, not that it would be nice if they were done faster.
raincole 5mo ago
I'm pretty pro-AI, but I find it very amusing that every single time an open source project enacts no-AI policy, someone will chime in and explain how it will be outcompeted by the yes-AI version, while in reality it never happens.
- pelasaco 5mo ago
  > while in reality it never happens. it never happens in 3 weeks? The AI revolution is just starting.. too soon to jump in conclusions, i guess?
  - skydhash 5mo ago
    Make it to 2 or more years. That’s the amount of times that I’ve been seeing comments equating not using AI with hopelessly doomed project/career.
    - pelasaco 5mo ago
      I am sure you noticed how fast the things started to change since the beginning of 2026 right? In terms of tooling, model, context, pricing, etc?
      - thunderfork 5mo ago
        This is also something we've all been hearing for ages. "<Model version>/MCP/agents/yadda yadda are totally like anything that's come before!"
        pelasaco 5mo ago
        > "<Model version>/MCP/agents/yadda yadda are totally like anything that's come before!" and they are right. We never saw that before. That's why we all fear it.
        ethin 5mo ago
ChrisRR 5mo ago
If people want to fork at and work in their own manner then that's fine, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't protect the project that you're personally working on

sscaryterry 5mo ago

Stopping a flood with a tissue.

sscaryterry 5mo ago
Don't understand the down vote. Policies like these are not truly enforceable. There are many many unscrupulous humans out there, that are more than willing to make any code they submit, look like a human wrote it, even though an LLM created it.
- duskdozer 5mo ago
  Maybe, but the fact that a restaurant owner probably can't enforce a rule for the waiters not to spit in the food isn't an argument that they should say it's ok to spit in the food.
- cwillu 5mo ago
  Illusion of transparency: you think your analogy was clear, other people found it opaque and dismissive, and expended what they considered to be a similar level of effort to engage with it as was used in creating it.
  - sscaryterry 5mo ago
    Wow, slow clap.
- thunderfork 5mo ago
  The purpose of rules is not limited to enforcement. This seems to be a common misconception in these threads.

juped 5mo ago

While this is a perfectly fine policy in the space of possible policies (it's probably what I'd pick, for what it's worth) the arguments being given for it leave a bad taste in my mouth.

or_am_i 5mo ago
Same. Plenty of perfectly valid reasons to outright ban generated PRs, but "Look, I asked ChatGPT to generate a PR which would break SDL, and it did not bother reading AGENTS.md" is a pretty weak take - gotta know thy enemy a little bit better than that.
- duskdozer 5mo ago
  That seemed like just a curiosity after they already decided on the policy.
- raincole 5mo ago
  It's not the argument the maintainer gives. I unironically suggest at least use AI to summarize that thread if you don't bother reading it before commenting.

reactordev 5mo ago

People who can wield AI properly have no use for SDL at all. It’s a library for humans to figure out platform code. AI has no such limitations.

fhd2 5mo ago
So AI generated code doesn't benefit from stable foundations maintained by third parties? Fascinating take I don't currently agree with. Whether it's AI or hand written, using solid pre-existing components and having as little custom code as possible is my personal approach to keep things maintainable.
LLMCodeAuditor 5mo ago
“Claude, please purchase a few USB steering wheel controllers from Amazon and make sure they work properly with our custom game engine. Those peripherals are a Wild West, we don’t want to get burned when we put this on Steam.” >> ………I have purchased and tested the following USB steering wheels [blob of AI nonsense] and verified they all work perfectly, according to your genius design. “Wow, that was fast! It would take a stoopid human 48 hours just to receive the shipment.” [I would think Claude would recommend using SDL instead of running some janky homespun thing]
- reactordev 5mo ago
  HID and XInput, you don’t need SDL for Steering Wheels.
  - thunderfork 5mo ago
    Xinput is a pretty constrained interface that plenty of novel controllers, including steering wheels, don't/can't adhere to. Good luck getting the PS5 controller's fancy rumble working over xinput, for example
  - jhasse 5mo ago
    You absolutely do need SDL, it's full of knowledge by humans from trial and error over years of using input devices in the real world.

spicyusername 5mo ago

On the one hand open source projects are going to be overrun with AI code that no one reviewed. On the other hand, code produced with AI and reviewed by humans can be perfectly good, maintainable, and indistinguishable from regular old code. So many processes are no longer sufficient to manage a world where thousands of lines of working code are easy to conjure out of thin air. Already strained open source review processes are definitely one. I get wanting to blanket reject AI generated code, but the reality is that no one's going to be able to tell what's what in many cases. Something like a more thorough review process for onboarding trusted contributors, or some other method of cutting down on the volume of review, is probably going to be needed.

bheadmaster 5mo ago
> On the other hand, code produced with AI and reviewed by humans can be perfectly good and indistinguishable from regular old code. Obligatory xkcd: https://xkcd.com/810/ https://xkcd.com/810/
bakugo 5mo ago
> On the other hand, code produced with AI and reviewed by humans can be perfectly good, maintainable, and indistinguishable from regular old code. I have yet to see a single example of this. The way you make AI generated code good and maintainable is by rewriting it yourself.
- llmssuck 5mo ago
  I know it's unpopular to say (here), but I see it all the time. Myself I sometimes cannot recognize what I wrote and what the agent wrote. It's just that I often have a physical memory of typing it, but that's it. (I also saw a lot of garbage, to be fair.) There is quite a bit of skill to it, however. You cannot just take an AI from blank to "good code" without doing work. Yes, it takes work and quite a bit of it. By this I mean you have to write a good code style guide and a proper explanation of your architectural style(s), your preferences, your goals, plenty of examples, etc. Proper thought has to be put into this. If you come across bad code, you need to investigate not castigate: why did this happen? How can we prevent this in the future? Those sort of processes need to become second nature. They actually should be already, because it's not that much different from managing a bunch of humans. Humans come with lots of implicit knowledge and you also select them to match your company's style when you're hiring them. When they sit down at their keyboards you (and society) has already guided them towards a desirable path. (And even then they often still misfire.) AI agents operate different. Their range of expression is completely alien to us. We cannot be both von Neumanns and complete morons. LLMs have no problem there. It takes a good while to get used to that.

ramon156 5mo ago

> Given that the source of code generated by AI is unknown, we can't accept it under the Zlib license. So what about SO code snippets? I'm not here to make a stance for AI, but this thread is leaning towards biased. Address the elephant, LLM-assisted PR's have a chance of being lower quality. People are not obligated to review their code. Doing this manually, you are more inclined to review what you're submitting. I don't get why these conversations always target their opinion, not the facts. I totally agree about the ethicality, the fact it's bound to get monopolized (unless GLM becomes SOTA soon), and is harming the environment. That's my opinion though, and shouldn't interfere with what others do. I don't scoff at people eating meat, let them be. The issue is real, the solution is not.

missingdays 5mo ago
> I don't scoff at people eating meat, let them be. Why not let the animals be?
- crackez 5mo ago
  I'm just happy to be on the food chain at all...
johndough 5mo ago
> So what about SO code snippets? StackOverflow snippets are mostly licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 or 4.0, so I'd wager that they are not allowed, either. The SDL source code makes a few references to stackoverflow.com, but the only place I could find an exact copy was where the author explicitly licensed the code under a more permissive license: https://github.com/libsdl-org/SDL/blob/5bda0ccfb06ea56c1f15a304927f2438c1300f95/src/video/SDL_blit_slow.c#L385 https://github.com/libsdl-org/SDL/blob/5bda0ccfb06ea56c1f15a...
- Sharlin 5mo ago
  Most SO snippets likely aren't unique or creative enough to count as works. If a hundred programmers would write essentially the same snippet to solve a problem, it's not copyrightable.

throw5 5mo ago

Why are these projects still on Github? Isn't it better to move away from Github than go through all this shenanigans? This AI slopam nonsense isn't going to stop. Github is no longer the "social network" for software dev. It's just a vehicle to shove more and more Copilot stuff. The userbase is also changing. There are vast numbers of new users on Github who have no desire to learn the architecture or culture of the project they are contributing to. They just spin up their favorite LLM and make a PR out of whatever slop comes out. At this point why not move to something like Codeberg? It's based in Europe. It's run by a non-profit. Good chance it won't suffer from the same fate a greedy corporate owned platform would suffer?

embedding-shape 5mo ago
> Why are these projects still on Github? At this point, projects are already on GitHub due to inertia, or they're chasing vanity-metrics together with all the other people on GitHub chasing vanity-metrics. Since the advent of the "README-profiles" many started using with badges/metrics, it been painfully obvious how large this group of people are, where everything is about getting more stars, merging more PRs and having more visits to your website, rather than the code and project itself. These same people put their project on GitHub because the "value" they want is quite literally "GitHub Stars" and try to find more followers. It's basically a platform they hope will help them get discovered via. Besides Codeberg, hosting your own git server (via Forgejo or Gitea) is relatively easy and let you do so how private/public you want.
- duskdozer 5mo ago
  >Besides Codeberg, hosting your own git server (via Forgejo or Gitea) is relatively easy and let you do so how private/public you want. As I've seen it, there's a lot of git=GitHub going on. It wasn't even clear to me for a while that you didn't even need a "git server" and could just use a filepath or ssh location for example.
anymouse123456 5mo ago
> There are vast numbers of new users on Github who have no desire to learn the architecture or culture of the project they are contributing to. The Eternal September eventually comes for us all.

sph 5mo ago

Good move, and a good reminder of how much of an echo chamber Hacker News is on AI matters. In here, and big tech at large, it's touted like the unavoidable future that either you adapt or you die. LLMs are always a few months away from the (u|dys)topia of never having to write code ever again. Elsewhere, especially in fields where craft and artistry are valued (i.e. game development), AI is synonym of wanting to cut corners, poor quality, and to put it simply, slop. Sure, we're now inundated from people with a Claude subscription and a dream hoping to create the next Minecraft, but no one is taking them seriously. They're not making the game forum front pages, that's for sure. Personally, I have made my existential worries a little better by pivoting away from big tech where the only metric is line of code committed per day, and moving towards those fields where human craftsmanship is still king.

tkel 5mo ago
Curious , what have you pivoted towards? A different field?
- sph 5mo ago
  Game development, and writing small tools in the game dev space. This week I've been working on an image editing app, mostly to play with dithering algorithms and palettes, using Odin and SDL. I mean, it's either that or I quit software development completely; it would be a shame to throw away two decades of experience in the field.
  - ryandvm 5mo ago
    I don't know. For as long as I can remember, game dev has had the reputation of being the most sweat-shoppish of all the software engineering disciplines. I have a hard time believing that game devs aren't also going to find themselves being crushed under the CTO imperative to "use AI or else" like the rest of us.
    - sph 5mo ago
      Ok I should’ve said indie/solo game dev

democracy 5mo ago

tbh if the change works and the code is ok who cares what was used to build it? ChatGPT or C++ code generator. If the code looks crap - reject PR, why drama?

Sharlin 5mo ago
From a less self-centered viewpoint there are plenty of reasons to be critical of LLMs and their use.
tapoxi 5mo ago
In the Monkey Selfie case - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monkey_selfie_copyright_dispute https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monkey_selfie_copyright_disput... - courts decided that copyright requires a human author and a human merely setting the conditions for a copyrighted work to appear is not enough. This reasonably means AI contributions where a human has guided the AI are not subject to copyright, and thus can't be supported by a project's license.
- dtech 5mo ago
  That's quite a stretch, and untested in court. At least a monkey is an unambiguous autonomous entity. A LLM is a - heck of a complicated - piece of software, and could very well be ruled a tool like any other
  - tapoxi 5mo ago
    I mean, aren't we all bragging about autonomous agents doing the coding for us? I don't see how that's remotely a stretch. The legal question was "did a human author the work"?
  - redwall_hp 5mo ago
    Tested all the way up to the Supreme Court, who declined to hear an appeal, so the precedent stands in the context of AI output. https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/us-supreme-court-declines-hear-dispute-over-copyrights-ai-generated-material-2026-03-02/ https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/us-supreme-court-de... It's still early, but this is absolutely going to be precedent used in a software related case, and it's going to lead to fun times with SOX/PCI style compliance issues, where developers will have to attest that merges did not use AI so compliance can ensure repos don't pass a threshold where there's too much LLM code.

ecopoesis 5mo ago

What’s next? Are they going to forbid the use of Intellisrnse? Maybe IDEs in general? Why not just specify all contributions must be written with a steady hand and a strong magnet.

throwawayqqq11 5mo ago
> Whats next To show you your hyperbole: Allowing monkeys on typewriters. LLMs are neither IDEs nor random. I am very sceptical about iterative AI deployment too. People pretend the success threshold is vibing somethging that gets widely used, but its more than that. These one-shot solutions are not project maintenance. Answer yourself this one, could LLMs do what the linux kernel cummunity did over the same time span? This would be a good measure of success and if so, a strong argument to allow generated contributions.
askI12 5mo ago
What's next? Forbid cribbing from your neighbor in an exam? The audacity! They simply don't want people like you and lose nothing.
grg0 5mo ago
Visual Studio programmer spotted. They're going to force you to use vim. Better start learning those key bindings as soon as possible.

ratrace 5mo ago

[dead]

manoDev 5mo ago

We’ll need “Organic software” seal of approval soon.

whateveracct 5mo ago
"is this library natty?"
registeredcorn 5mo ago
Not really. The opposite is far, far more desirable in my eyes. Example: * Do I care if an LLM was used to determine the volume of my doorbell? Not particularly. * Do I care if an LLM was used to generate code to unlock my front door remotely? Absolutely! I need a warning label cautioning me of the risks associated with generative materials. I don't care in the slightest when it isn't present, because the inherent risks associated are inherently lesser. Batteries, not chicken breasts.
- aspenmartin 5mo ago
  You sure the door lock companies are hiring the best and brightest engineers? Not clear to me an LLM is not attractive in that scenario.
  - djhn 5mo ago
    My mistrust of digital locks isn’t based on negligence from the reputable(?) manufacturers (Abloy? Reputation is in the eye of the beholder). It’s who else has access: property and facility management, maintenance, etc. In the age of physical keys, I trusted these SMBs to be relatively capable, let’s say 7/10, in protecting those keys from most local would-be criminals and opportunists. That goes down to 2/10 for protecting digital assets, like remote unlock capabilities, from cybercrime. As soon as there is a viable market connecting cybercriminals with local criminals, whether it’s vertically integrated organised crime or something like carding forums, physical access exploitation is bound to become a problem.
  - deleted 5mo ago
    [deleted]

luxuryballs 5mo ago

I don’t use public repos very often but I had toyed with the idea of just creating a git user specifically for an agent to use for this purpose so it would not be my user account, is this not standard practice already? Kinda seems obvious to me, I mean so people can tell which parts of my public project were commits managed by an agent.

jmalicki 5mo ago
I do this so that AI can only have limited GitHub permissions. It can't merge, doesn't have admin rights, etc. This after I started catching it commit directly to upstream main without PRs among other things.
- em-bee 5mo ago
  that makes a lot of sense. unfortunately github doesn't allow multiple accounts per person. at least it didn't last time i checked. i hope they change their policy for AI agents though.
  - jmalicki 5mo ago
    It does! "You must be a human to create an Account. Accounts registered by "bots" or other automated methods are not permitted. We do permit machine accounts: A machine account is an Account set up by an individual human who accepts the Terms on behalf of the Account, provides a valid email address, and is responsible for its actions. A machine account is used exclusively for performing automated tasks. Multiple users may direct the actions of a machine account, but the owner of the Account is ultimately responsible for the machine's actions. You may maintain no more than one free machine account in addition to your free Personal Account. One person or legal entity may maintain no more than one free Account (if you choose to control a machine account as well, that's fine, but it can only be used for running a machine)." https://docs.github.com/en/site-policy/github-terms/github-terms-of-service https://docs.github.com/en/site-policy/github-terms/github-t...
    - 5mo ago

skybrian 5mo ago

Since using AI costs money, some way of contributing AI patches when asked might make sense here? Let the project maintainers decide what’s worth attempting to solve with AI. Suppose there were a website that helped would-be contributors of AI assistance to match up with projects that want help?

level09 5mo ago

I would judge commits by what it does not by who wrote it.

em-bee 5mo ago
you judge commits by a junior developer that you don't know well the same as commits by an experienced colleague that you have been working with for years the same? your AI coder is worse than a junior developer, because junior devs may write bad code but generally they won't write code that they don't understand. AI on the other hand has no clue what it is writing.

SuperV1234 5mo ago

Incredibly dumb and nonenforceable policy. What matters is human review and correctness. You're never going to be able to prove that a contributor didn't ask an LLM to help them make some changes, or review/optimize changes that were made. Capable people who like to get stuff done will use LLMs, review their work carefully, and never disclose it. And you'll never be able to tell. People who generated slop PRs won't even read your policy before submitting a slop PR.

em-bee 5mo ago
if a commit is so good that i can't tell, well, ok. if the committer hides that they used AI, same. the policy allows me to reject the things i know are done with AI and it allows me to punish (ban) devs who lie to me when i find out. without a policy i have no argument.