I want to learn, but I can't display that I learned them. You know the whole thing where real projects are more valuable than simply "I did a tutorial"? I struggle to find ways to apply LLMs practically beyond like one project (which is basically someone else's anyway). That's my struggle.
If you can't figure out something innovative and ground breaking to do as a project try to copy something which already exists and you find useful.
It can be an app or website, or something else. By trying to replicate something you will begin to learn and understand what the limitations and opportunities in these tools are.
Developers hanging out on eg Hacker News are the very tip of the wave. 99% of all developers don't visit sites like this. It will take a long time (10+ years.) before AI moves through all fields. Companies which are inherently software focused will be first. But that's not where the long tail of software is.
The long tail is in companies which does no software currently. Places where software is something you buy to do inventory or keep track of invoices or time sheets.
I use these tools everyday now and they are both magically awesome and stupendously stupid, sometimes in the same reply. Things always change less in the short term (say less than 5 years), and more in long term (10+ years). Just as it was with smartphones, arguably the most recent big revolution which is now integrated everywhere.
To reiterate. To find a project chose something which already exist and you use and have use of. Then copy it. Then improve it (to better for your use.)
Personally I think this new revolution will make software exponentially more abundant and infinitely customizable and adaptable to individuals. My guess is also that in 10-20 years we will have more people than today who do "programming".
A lot of tasks which are now hacked together in Excel sheets will be a lot easier to make into "proper" programs.
In this world the people who know enough about many things to efficiently use agents to accelerate them will be the most valuable.
