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I can share a weird story: Usually, I take my time to understand each keyword of the code I'm looking at, especially if it is new to me, like terraform. I wor

by mawadev 12d ago

I can share a weird story: Usually, I take my time to understand each keyword of the code I'm looking at, especially if it is new to me, like terraform. I work in a team/with one architect, who only did the DevOps/Infra stuff for the past years and I had the expectation he knows what he is doing and talking about. At around 2 weeks, I noticed how his knowledge has severe gaps and how he takes things at face value or uses terminology interchangably, which confuses me. It sounds plausible, but it does not actually translate into a working system or shared understanding. Then one day I did some pair programming with him and whenever there was an error or a resource missing, he would type it into the LLM, copy paste it out of it and then brute force error messages. He did not even wait a second to think or reconcile whats happening on the screen or what the exact requirement is. Never taking one step back and questioning any assumption. Now that the timeline is shifting and everyone starts to be stressed, he continues to vibe code through me and it is so tiring, there is no higher level planning or architecture, its just a reactive type of trial and error to be faster. It feels like these people are so used to talking to bots, that they treat you like an agent they can chat to or talk through monologs with. It is quite shocking how people went from being humble (learn the basics or close the gaps in understanding) to full on authority on everything and berating people 24/7... So right now I'm considering quitting IT for a couple of years until people calm down, but I think its pretty futile

DiggyJohnson 12d ago
You captured this phenomenon very well in this comment. Appreciate you sharing it because it’s hard to describe exactly what makes this sort of behavior so bizarre.
- backlava12 11d ago
  [dead]
- mattm 11d ago
  @backlava12 fyi your comments are all dead in this thread
  - backlava12 11d ago
    [dead]
2wrist 12d ago
Great comment. At my place, this is what they want. They want people to smash through things as fast as possible. They don’t want people to sit and craft a solution which takes in to account the whole. They are choosing tools which are low code, and use llm’s to produce what they need. as they say “this is the way things are going”.
- noisy_boy 11d ago
  Even that would be acceptable. But they still blame the programmer, who was pressured into this, for any fallouts because of it. Basically trying to have it both ways. The unreasonableness of it is infuriating.
  - skydhash 11d ago
    Pretty much this, they want to impose one method, but they don’t want to own the mistakes that it creates. Sometimes it felt like the bullies that are saying “why are you making me hurting you?”.
    - noisy_boy 11d ago
      I see it as laying the groundwork for firing. This is bound to blow-up in production eventually which would be a good enough excuse. If it doesn't, reduce token budget and squeeze some more until it breaks.
- oblio 11d ago
  In today's episode: "Programmers frustrated that they're being treated like craftspeople or delivery drivers or factory workers, etc, etc."
  - ofjcihen 11d ago
    I don’t understand how this comment is productive for any of the groups involved. Can you explain it to me?
wccrawford 12d ago
I don't think it's generalizable. The kind of person who copy and pastes from the AI is the kind who did the same from StackOverflow before. It's more compelling, and we probably see more of them because of it, but it's the same general thing. The kind of person who insists on understanding things and working through the problem has always been rarer. It's not "humble", it's "inquisitive" and "persistent".
- danielheath 12d ago
  I'm seeing people who _used to be_ like that losing that understanding without realizing it's happening - they have a superficial idea of what the code is doing, enough to feel like they understand it, but the change is apparent when watching them handle something unexpected.
  - Tade0 12d ago
    LLMs reduced interest on tech debt, but it's still there and people who have a tendency to acquire it will go bankrupt eventually.
    - oblio 11d ago
      "The code market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent." will probably be a thing.
      - bigstrat2003 11d ago
        That's certainly what I expect to happen. LLMs will ruin your software if you don't hand-hold them, but it'll take time for that to happen. And until that does happen, businesses hell bent on using them won't have anything to push them into realizing what a mistake it was to use them.
        Terr_ 11d ago
        Two imagined executive responses: 1. "Nonsense, if it was a code-quality issue from the AI stuff, we'd have seen problems sooner, like in the first few months or a year. Oh, sure, some engineers complained, but that was just an adjustment period because they stopped once we told them we didn't care and mandated that they up-skill into the new AI-centric workflow future." 2. "The bold new AI initiative I put into place can't possibly be wrong, this failure is on the engineers who were responsible for overseeing its operation. This is supremely disappointing because we made their jobs so easy, they no longer have to write code, just review several dozens of pages per day with unremitting paranoid vigilance and attention to detail."
MichaelRo 12d ago
>> he continues to vibe code through me So quit pair programming. I never did, never will do that, nor worked at a place that remotely encouraged that. Each to their own, that's how it should be.
- mawadev 11d ago
  I wish this was always possible, but sometimes you do it when stuff is ambigous or the task is almost undefined and you just can't reach far enough for someone to fix it, so going over it and talking is simpler
huurtehoog 11d ago
> It is quite shocking how people went from being humble (learn the basics or close the gaps in understanding) to full on authority on everything and berating people 24/7... That was never humility. That was fear. This technology is just enabling people to show their through colors. The unearned confidence is a hell of a drug.
anal_reactor 11d ago
I don't think this is going to change because it helps automate code production. As in, once we reach a point where this method produces acceptable results, we can fire all engineers and automate the process.

by mawadev 12d ago

DiggyJohnson 12d ago

You captured this phenomenon very well in this comment. Appreciate you sharing it because it’s hard to describe exactly what makes this sort of behavior so bizarre.

backlava12 11d ago
[dead]
mattm 11d ago
@backlava12 fyi your comments are all dead in this thread
- backlava12 11d ago
  [dead]

2wrist 12d ago

Great comment. At my place, this is what they want. They want people to smash through things as fast as possible. They don’t want people to sit and craft a solution which takes in to account the whole. They are choosing tools which are low code, and use llm’s to produce what they need. as they say “this is the way things are going”.

noisy_boy 11d ago
Even that would be acceptable. But they still blame the programmer, who was pressured into this, for any fallouts because of it. Basically trying to have it both ways. The unreasonableness of it is infuriating.
- skydhash 11d ago
  Pretty much this, they want to impose one method, but they don’t want to own the mistakes that it creates. Sometimes it felt like the bullies that are saying “why are you making me hurting you?”.
  - noisy_boy 11d ago
    I see it as laying the groundwork for firing. This is bound to blow-up in production eventually which would be a good enough excuse. If it doesn't, reduce token budget and squeeze some more until it breaks.
oblio 11d ago
In today's episode: "Programmers frustrated that they're being treated like craftspeople or delivery drivers or factory workers, etc, etc."
- ofjcihen 11d ago
  I don’t understand how this comment is productive for any of the groups involved. Can you explain it to me?

wccrawford 12d ago

I don't think it's generalizable. The kind of person who copy and pastes from the AI is the kind who did the same from StackOverflow before. It's more compelling, and we probably see more of them because of it, but it's the same general thing. The kind of person who insists on understanding things and working through the problem has always been rarer. It's not "humble", it's "inquisitive" and "persistent".

danielheath 12d ago
I'm seeing people who _used to be_ like that losing that understanding without realizing it's happening - they have a superficial idea of what the code is doing, enough to feel like they understand it, but the change is apparent when watching them handle something unexpected.
- Tade0 12d ago
  LLMs reduced interest on tech debt, but it's still there and people who have a tendency to acquire it will go bankrupt eventually.
  - oblio 11d ago
    "The code market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent." will probably be a thing.
    - bigstrat2003 11d ago
      That's certainly what I expect to happen. LLMs will ruin your software if you don't hand-hold them, but it'll take time for that to happen. And until that does happen, businesses hell bent on using them won't have anything to push them into realizing what a mistake it was to use them.
      - Terr_ 11d ago
        Two imagined executive responses: 1. "Nonsense, if it was a code-quality issue from the AI stuff, we'd have seen problems sooner, like in the first few months or a year. Oh, sure, some engineers complained, but that was just an adjustment period because they stopped once we told them we didn't care and mandated that they up-skill into the new AI-centric workflow future." 2. "The bold new AI initiative I put into place can't possibly be wrong, this failure is on the engineers who were responsible for overseeing its operation. This is supremely disappointing because we made their jobs so easy, they no longer have to write code, just review several dozens of pages per day with unremitting paranoid vigilance and attention to detail."

MichaelRo 12d ago

>> he continues to vibe code through me So quit pair programming. I never did, never will do that, nor worked at a place that remotely encouraged that. Each to their own, that's how it should be.

mawadev 11d ago
I wish this was always possible, but sometimes you do it when stuff is ambigous or the task is almost undefined and you just can't reach far enough for someone to fix it, so going over it and talking is simpler

huurtehoog 11d ago

> It is quite shocking how people went from being humble (learn the basics or close the gaps in understanding) to full on authority on everything and berating people 24/7... That was never humility. That was fear. This technology is just enabling people to show their through colors. The unearned confidence is a hell of a drug.

anal_reactor 11d ago

I don't think this is going to change because it helps automate code production. As in, once we reach a point where this method produces acceptable results, we can fire all engineers and automate the process.