The person you replied to suggests that the analogy of a 3d printer building a part does not hold, as LLM-based coding systems are able to both "print" some code, and decide where and when to do so.

I tend to agree with them. What people seem to miss about LLM coding systems, IMO:

a) deciding on the capabilities of an LLM to code after a brief browser session with 4o/claude is comparable to waking up a coder in the middle of the night, and having them recite the perfect code right then and there. So a lot of people interact with it that way, decide it's meh, and write it off.

b) most people haven't tinkered with with systems that incorporate more of the tools human developers use day to day. They'd be surprised of what even small, local models can do.

c) LLMs seem perfectly capable to always add another layer of abstraction on top of whatever "thing" they get good at. Good at summaries? Cool, now abstract that for memory. Good at q/a? Cool, now abstract that over document parsing for search. Good at coding? Cool, now abstract that over software architecture.

d) Most people haven't seen any RL-based coding systems yet. That's fun.

----

Now, of course the article is perfectly reasonable, and we shouldn't take what any CEO says at face value. But I think the pessimism, especially in coding, is also misplaced, and will ultimately be proven wrong.