I think the AI code gen tools can be great. But, you have to understand and be able to take what they give you and actually build something coherent with them, because (at least with the current generation) they clearly have pretty firmly bounded limits to what they can generate and figure out.
I actually think this makes a huge advantage for the previous generation of engineers, who didn’t grow up with them. Because we all spent time sitting around creating octree classes and ring buffers, new ones with incredible amounts of repeated effort for every new project, we actually had to learn to be comfortable with reading and understanding and writing code. The muscles had to get strong. I feel like, whether or not AI progresses (soon) to the point that it can make a whole codebase for you and it’ll all work, the engineers who grew up having to develop strong coding muscles will always have some level of advantage.
It’s like the old-school carpenters who can knock in a nail with 3 hammer strikes and have everything organized in their minds to have what they need in their tool bag every single morning and not have to go and get something new. You can always learn to use the power tools. You can’t go back and force yourself through the time consuming apprenticeship to work out how to work without them, though, once they exist.
I think the AI code gen tools can be great. But, you have to understand and be able to take what they give you and actually build something coherent with them, because (at least with the current generation) they clearly have pretty firmly bounded limits to what they can generate and figure out.
I actually think this makes a huge advantage for the previous generation of engineers, who didn’t grow up with them. Because we all spent time sitting around creating octree classes and ring buffers, new ones with incredible amounts of repeated effort for every new project, we actually had to learn to be comfortable with reading and understanding and writing code. The muscles had to get strong. I feel like, whether or not AI progresses (soon) to the point that it can make a whole codebase for you and it’ll all work, the engineers who grew up having to develop strong coding muscles will always have some level of advantage.
It’s like the old-school carpenters who can knock in a nail with 3 hammer strikes and have everything organized in their minds to have what they need in their tool bag every single morning and not have to go and get something new. You can always learn to use the power tools. You can’t go back and force yourself through the time consuming apprenticeship to work out how to work without them, though, once they exist.