18 ms·

Big no for retyping llm generated code by hand. But a big yes for still typing code by hand, and not leaving it to the llm. Except it has to be the code genera

by npras1 2mo ago

Big no for retyping llm generated code by hand. But a big yes for still typing code by hand, and not leaving it to the llm. Except it has to be the code generated by your brain. That is what will create new neurons and new connections, which is what will keep away the cognitive decline. And the constraint of not having to use llms will enhance creativity. Actually, the constraints llms add to your code are more in number than the former. llms code in only the specific ways they've been trained on. So you won't ever come across of other ways. Off the top of my head.. here's RubyQuiz.com [0] which I came across when I was learning ruby more than a decade ago. Looking at the many user-submitted solutions (you have to download the zip file!) you'll see completely different ways the problems were solved. Sure, many won't be deemed efficient or standard by today's llm or rubocop checks, but looking at their code.. and retyping them and seeing them work.. was crucial in how I was able to think in Ruby for solving coding problems. I did the same with Go too, with the "learn go with tests" guide [1]. [0] - http://rubyquiz.com/ http://rubyquiz.com/ [1] - https://quii.gitbook.io/learn-go-with-tests https://quii.gitbook.io/learn-go-with-tests

kakacik 2mo ago
There are jobs where llms can massively speed up delivery. Think about tiny/one man indie games for example, they can also get (stolen) assets almost for free. Helping with hobby projects, a subtype of that one man show. Then there are sluggish corporate jobs. Here, even 10x speed up of development won't change delivery dates significantly or at all. I am in one such job, team leader has claude code higher tier and basically uses it for some more complex bash scripts and thats mostly it. Given this topic, I dont complain much, I value my long term senior skills way more than those new agentic ones. The middle is... well somewhere middle.
- Zambyte 2mo ago
  Copying is not theft.
  - ebcode 1mo ago
    Can we get that added to the US Constitution and the UN Declaration of Human Rights?
    - Zambyte 1mo ago
      Does it need to be added? I don't think anything legal considers copying theft. Copyright infringement and theft are literally just different crimes. I don't think copyright should exist at all, but conflating infringement with theft helps no one. Well, maybe Disney and other copyright empires.
jader201 2mo ago
> But a big yes for still typing code by hand, and not leaving it to the llm. Except it has to be the code generated by your brain. > That is what will create new neurons and new connections, which is what will keep away the cognitive decline. 100% agree with this. The problem is, your employer doesn’t care whether your brain is creating new neurons and connections. They care about productivity and profit. I feel like the folks that believe we can continue to write code by hand are either in denial that LLMs will eventually (if not already) outperform handwritten code, or are in denial that employers will be ok with lower levels of productivity. If you have the luxury of working for an employer that either doesn’t care or is oblivious to this, then 100% continue writing code by hand. Or if you do work on the side (whether for fun or for profit) and are ok with lower productivity, then yes, stick to handwritten code. But just because handwriting code is better for your brain and cognitive development, doesn’t mean that the industry will be in support of it.
- coffeefirst 2mo ago
  Well there’s a lot of middle ground between “don’t use AI” and “generate everything, exclusively.” When the bill for the latter lands with a heavy thud, moderation and common sense start to look like a pretty good idea.
  - jader201 2mo ago
    > Well there’s a lot of middle ground between “don’t use AI” and “generate everything.” Sure, but again, this assumes both that handwriting code sometimes outperforms LLMs, and also that your employer agrees with this. I think it’s only a matter of time (again, if we’re not already there) before LLMs outperform handwritten code nearly all of the time. And, even if that’s not the case, I’m pretty convinced nearly all employers believe this is true, whether it is or not. So your employer only sees a “middle ground” as room for higher productivity.
    - Henchman21 2mo ago
      Perhaps the thing we’re going to learn to leave behind after all the dust settles … will be shitty management at shitty companies? Because to be honest, more and more it seems many businesses have no real purpose other than to act as a sort of adult daycare for otherwise useless people.
danielvaughn 2mo ago
I disagree. Before coding agents really took off, back in like 2022, I was trying to learn how to create grammars in Treesitter. One evening I sat down with ChatGPT and had it generate a grammar for me. But because it was on ChatGPT, I had to manually write everything it spit out. What ended up happening is that I was typing, I'd notice little weird bits here and there, and I'd ask questions about it, explore alternatives, etc. So the end result was partially generated by ChatGPT, but also partially influenced by me. But the biggest win was that within 3-4 hours, I was comfortable enough with the syntax that I was writing it entirely by hand, without AI assistance. Now, if all you're doing is literally typing the characters and not thinking at all about what you're typing, and if you accept the LLMs output verbatim, then yes I'd say that you aren't really learning anything. But this is no different than just copying things from Stack Overflow. That behavior is nothing new. The core distinction, as always, is whether you are exercising your brain.
- rzzzt 1mo ago
  Was copying to the clipboard disallowed back then?
  - danielvaughn 1mo ago
    No, but I consciously chose not to do that, because I wanted to gain muscle memory by typing the code by hand.
- spacer-dinos 1mo ago
  [flagged]
m3kw9 2mo ago
so don't use LLMs? You cannot get away from it now, the skill lies in how to generate code small enough for you to digest, as opposed to vibe coder where they generate so much code, there is no way to read it but to accept the run test.
moffkalast 2mo ago
It is somewhat accepted that typing does nothing for memory versus handwriting, so I'm not sure why we're even bothering tbh.
mclau153 2mo ago
I don't think OP is telling people to literally type verbatim what the LLM generated, I think he is still implying that during the typing you are also thinking and possibly tweaking the code you are typing out, it is already a big step up from copy-paste
ivan888 2mo ago
I would love an agentic tool that simply finds code locations and opens them in my editor, so that I can write the implementation. I find this to be the most tedious and disorienting part, especially in languages without strong typing, that de-emphasize navigable references between classes. For example, wouldn’t necessarily need this tool for Java. Would like it for Ruby.
jolt42 2mo ago
I used to type in the programs from Commodore 64 Magazine back in the day. If you just touch type them in you learn very little. If I wanted to understand them, I wouldn't do it while typing. Sure a bit rubs off and probably more if you have to understand where to put the code rather than just start typing from the top, but still not enough. If you "make it your own" then you're probably at the right level of understanding.
scelerat 1mo ago
I think people use these tools in varying ways, sometimes in the same session, and there are no hard-and-fast correct answers. For example: Sometimes I just need to blast something out which works well enough so I can either consider the output or play with the tool it generated to see if I'm on the track for solving my bigger problem. In these instances, I just say, do it, and don't focus too much on the code it produces. Sometimes I am using languages or tools I am not an expert in. In many of these cases, I do manually type out the LLM's suggestions so that I am more intimately familiar with the syntax, libraries and idioms being used. Frequently pausing to look at actual documentation or find examples of sample code. It's a more interactive version of what I might have been doing a couple years ago googling solutions on stack overflow.
phkahler 1mo ago
An entire generation of programmers was created in the 1980s from typing code from magazines. OTOH the only way to run it was to first type it in. Today people have too many options to be bothered I suppose.
gw32 1mo ago
> Big no for retyping llm generated code by hand. There must be some merit to retyping LLM generated code, even verbatim. In school, I would rewrite or re-typeset notes as a study habit. In doing so, I'd review content, detect errors, synthesize concepts simply because rewriting notes forced me to pay attention at the per-word level. While retyping LLM code is not something I personally do, I'd imagine it could bestow similar benefits.

by npras1 2mo ago

kakacik 2mo ago

There are jobs where llms can massively speed up delivery. Think about tiny/one man indie games for example, they can also get (stolen) assets almost for free. Helping with hobby projects, a subtype of that one man show. Then there are sluggish corporate jobs. Here, even 10x speed up of development won't change delivery dates significantly or at all. I am in one such job, team leader has claude code higher tier and basically uses it for some more complex bash scripts and thats mostly it. Given this topic, I dont complain much, I value my long term senior skills way more than those new agentic ones. The middle is... well somewhere middle.

Zambyte 2mo ago
Copying is not theft.
- ebcode 1mo ago
  Can we get that added to the US Constitution and the UN Declaration of Human Rights?
  - Zambyte 1mo ago
    Does it need to be added? I don't think anything legal considers copying theft. Copyright infringement and theft are literally just different crimes. I don't think copyright should exist at all, but conflating infringement with theft helps no one. Well, maybe Disney and other copyright empires.

jader201 2mo ago

> But a big yes for still typing code by hand, and not leaving it to the llm. Except it has to be the code generated by your brain. > That is what will create new neurons and new connections, which is what will keep away the cognitive decline. 100% agree with this. The problem is, your employer doesn’t care whether your brain is creating new neurons and connections. They care about productivity and profit. I feel like the folks that believe we can continue to write code by hand are either in denial that LLMs will eventually (if not already) outperform handwritten code, or are in denial that employers will be ok with lower levels of productivity. If you have the luxury of working for an employer that either doesn’t care or is oblivious to this, then 100% continue writing code by hand. Or if you do work on the side (whether for fun or for profit) and are ok with lower productivity, then yes, stick to handwritten code. But just because handwriting code is better for your brain and cognitive development, doesn’t mean that the industry will be in support of it.

coffeefirst 2mo ago
Well there’s a lot of middle ground between “don’t use AI” and “generate everything, exclusively.” When the bill for the latter lands with a heavy thud, moderation and common sense start to look like a pretty good idea.
- jader201 2mo ago
  > Well there’s a lot of middle ground between “don’t use AI” and “generate everything.” Sure, but again, this assumes both that handwriting code sometimes outperforms LLMs, and also that your employer agrees with this. I think it’s only a matter of time (again, if we’re not already there) before LLMs outperform handwritten code nearly all of the time. And, even if that’s not the case, I’m pretty convinced nearly all employers believe this is true, whether it is or not. So your employer only sees a “middle ground” as room for higher productivity.
  - Henchman21 2mo ago
    Perhaps the thing we’re going to learn to leave behind after all the dust settles … will be shitty management at shitty companies? Because to be honest, more and more it seems many businesses have no real purpose other than to act as a sort of adult daycare for otherwise useless people.

danielvaughn 2mo ago

I disagree. Before coding agents really took off, back in like 2022, I was trying to learn how to create grammars in Treesitter. One evening I sat down with ChatGPT and had it generate a grammar for me. But because it was on ChatGPT, I had to manually write everything it spit out. What ended up happening is that I was typing, I'd notice little weird bits here and there, and I'd ask questions about it, explore alternatives, etc. So the end result was partially generated by ChatGPT, but also partially influenced by me. But the biggest win was that within 3-4 hours, I was comfortable enough with the syntax that I was writing it entirely by hand, without AI assistance. Now, if all you're doing is literally typing the characters and not thinking at all about what you're typing, and if you accept the LLMs output verbatim, then yes I'd say that you aren't really learning anything. But this is no different than just copying things from Stack Overflow. That behavior is nothing new. The core distinction, as always, is whether you are exercising your brain.

rzzzt 1mo ago
Was copying to the clipboard disallowed back then?
- danielvaughn 1mo ago
  No, but I consciously chose not to do that, because I wanted to gain muscle memory by typing the code by hand.
spacer-dinos 1mo ago
[flagged]

m3kw9 2mo ago

so don't use LLMs? You cannot get away from it now, the skill lies in how to generate code small enough for you to digest, as opposed to vibe coder where they generate so much code, there is no way to read it but to accept the run test.

moffkalast 2mo ago

It is somewhat accepted that typing does nothing for memory versus handwriting, so I'm not sure why we're even bothering tbh.

mclau153 2mo ago

I don't think OP is telling people to literally type verbatim what the LLM generated, I think he is still implying that during the typing you are also thinking and possibly tweaking the code you are typing out, it is already a big step up from copy-paste

ivan888 2mo ago

I would love an agentic tool that simply finds code locations and opens them in my editor, so that I can write the implementation. I find this to be the most tedious and disorienting part, especially in languages without strong typing, that de-emphasize navigable references between classes. For example, wouldn’t necessarily need this tool for Java. Would like it for Ruby.

jolt42 2mo ago

I used to type in the programs from Commodore 64 Magazine back in the day. If you just touch type them in you learn very little. If I wanted to understand them, I wouldn't do it while typing. Sure a bit rubs off and probably more if you have to understand where to put the code rather than just start typing from the top, but still not enough. If you "make it your own" then you're probably at the right level of understanding.

scelerat 1mo ago

I think people use these tools in varying ways, sometimes in the same session, and there are no hard-and-fast correct answers. For example: Sometimes I just need to blast something out which works well enough so I can either consider the output or play with the tool it generated to see if I'm on the track for solving my bigger problem. In these instances, I just say, do it, and don't focus too much on the code it produces. Sometimes I am using languages or tools I am not an expert in. In many of these cases, I do manually type out the LLM's suggestions so that I am more intimately familiar with the syntax, libraries and idioms being used. Frequently pausing to look at actual documentation or find examples of sample code. It's a more interactive version of what I might have been doing a couple years ago googling solutions on stack overflow.

phkahler 1mo ago

An entire generation of programmers was created in the 1980s from typing code from magazines. OTOH the only way to run it was to first type it in. Today people have too many options to be bothered I suppose.

gw32 1mo ago

> Big no for retyping llm generated code by hand. There must be some merit to retyping LLM generated code, even verbatim. In school, I would rewrite or re-typeset notes as a study habit. In doing so, I'd review content, detect errors, synthesize concepts simply because rewriting notes forced me to pay attention at the per-word level. While retyping LLM code is not something I personally do, I'd imagine it could bestow similar benefits.