On: Getting a Gemini API key is an exercise in frustration

[rand17]

So you don't like writing "the boring code". What do you expect from writing a CRUD? What would you like to write? What "interesting problems" would you like to focus on? Great sadness will fall upon the industry when the last graybeard dies, who had this arcane knowledge of "writing code". I have bad Player Piano vibes nowdays.

Around me devs are beginning to warm up to the idea, that they are not coders (and neither should I be), but "prompt engineers". When I take too much time on a task, when I can't solve a problem with a push of a button, when I muse about copilot hallucinations in my PR - someone usually comes helpfully to tell me, I need better prompting skills. Have you tried this expression? Have you tried more context? Have you tried with this copy pasted magical formula?

No creative worker in human history was so overjoyed to devalue his or her work and knowledge in such haste.

[mittensc → rand17]

Other side of the equation:

I remember learning C++ with something like valgrind. I would write stupid code, validate, fix stupid issues.

Others before me learned the harder way.

With LLMs right now I'm learning frontend by just generating the UIs I want.

I'm getting the code/mocks and experimenting.

It's bad code, i will need to adjust, but it helps immensely as a starting point same as valgrind helped in the past.

Trying to learn via searching for info just doesn't work as well with all the flood of spam.

[rand17 → mittensc]

I do not think that all LLMs are evil; they are valid tools, but it's not a hammer with meta glasses attached to render everything into a nail. I also find it very useful in certain situations - but not in all situations.

Two more things. Bad code (in work, in reality, not in a hobby project) is rarely converted into good code. And the last one: in my twenty plus years of being a dev, this is the first year job offers simply just dried up. With bad code being good enough (hey, it compiles! it mostly works!), hopefully you and I will be the lucky few to still be in the business five years later.

[mittensc → rand17]

> Bad code (in work, in reality, not in a hobby project) is rarely converted into good code

Most code everywhere is bad code. Nobody cares unfortunately.

> And the last one: in my twenty plus years of being a dev, this is the first year job offers simply just dried up.

Actions of the US gov have caused a recession.

It's hard to find jobs in that environment

Put the blame where it's due.

AI is an excuse.

No company is going to hire now because of that.

There is also heavy bloat of incompetent software developers that needs to be shed.

Edit: Side note of shedding incompetent people

At work, I have a budget for tools, in the past this was handed over to contractors (think accenture).

They would come back with estimates of 1+ months, multiple developers and a manager for something I could do in a week.

They would deliver very poor quality and I had no choice.

With LLMs I can do the same quality of work in 30 minutes, then clean it up for a day and have a much better tool.

That budget is now used for other things and probably will be cut due to economic uncertainty.