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0 pointsgroundzeros201522d ago0 comments

I don’t think this is the full picture. Plenty of people who like writing code are happy to delete code too.

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6 comments · 1 top-level

Aurornis22d ago· 5 in thread

When you write the code you learn from writing the code.

When you have an LLM produce something and then delete, you didn’t learn much.

This is it for me. I can put up with a lot of struggle and non-sense if I feel like I'm actually developing some knowledge or skill. Vibe coding is a lot of the non-sense but little of the system knowledge actually sticks. Unless you very diligently try to understand every line, you're just as oblivious about the problem as you were when you started. At that point though the AI isn't making you any faster.

epihelix21d ago

You learnt (or should have learnt) that the strategy taken by the llm was a poor one. You then explore why it didn't work, and what would have been a better approach. You think about the structure of your code base, the issues you still need to solve, and then you roll back and start again - this time prompting a different approach.

I love coding. I've always loved coding. But coding with llms has helped me step back and see the overall design of a project better. And llms know tricks I didn't, and some of these are neat, and now I know them too. So, personally, I feel like I'm still learning, a lot. It's just a different way of learning - and one that makes coding interesting all over again.

(That said, I cannot use agentic systems and embed myself fully in the loop, and still code myself. Sometimes its faster to code the next change manually, sometimes it's faster to guide an llm. But it's still interesting, and it's even more fun, at least to me.)

theshrike7919d ago

I learn what is possible.

I know, for example. That I can take a Cheap Yellow Display from Aliexpress and have it show the train timetables and weather. BUT I also know that the timetable public Web API requires encryption - which is a pain with the small chip in the display - but the private API with an API key works via plain http.

I didn't write a single line of code, but the display is on my hallway cabinet, working 100% the way I like it.

CamperBob222d ago

you didn’t learn much.

And that's entirely your fault, not the LLM's.

paulryanrogers22d ago

'Entirely' is unfair. I do learn from working with AIs. Yet in the production pipeline their output can be so entangled (especially for non-text) that it's difficult to decompose and adjust without great effort.

Just today I was toying with AI to make some bumper music. It came up with some great phrases and fragments. But its 'song' output is a hilarious mess, and feels like I'd be better off starting from scratch and taking only the bits that work.

Then there's the ethical question of where those clever lyrics even came from. Perhaps just lifted from niche works I never heard before.

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