> Our ability to zoom in and implement code is now obsolete Even with SOTA LLMs like Opus 4.5 this is downright untrue. Many, many logical, strategic, architectural, and low level code mistakes are still happening. And given context window limitations of LLMs (even with hacks like subagents to work around this) big picture long-term thinking about code design, structure, extensibility, etc. is very tricky to do right.
> If you can't see this, I have to seriously question your competence as an engineer in the first place tbh.
I can't agree more strongly. I work with a number of folks who say concerning things along the lines of what you describe above (or just slightly less strong). The trust in a system that is not fully trustworthy is really shocking, but it only seems to come from a particular kind of person. It's hard to describe, but I'd describe it as: people that are less concerned with the contents of the code versus the behaviour of the program. It's a strange dichotomy, and surprising every time.
I mean, if you don't get the economics of a reasonably factored codebase vs one that's full of hacks and architecturally terrible compromises - you're in for a VERY bad time. Perhaps even a company-ending bad time. I've seen that happen in the old days, and I expect we're in the midst of seeing a giant wave of failures due to unsustainably maintained codebases. But we probably won't be able to tell, startups have been mostly failing the entire time.
One of the things about "math" is how theorems need to be proven to work for all numbers. I remember reading a thought experiment decades ago about an alien mathematics which didn't prove a theorem formally but would consider it proven if it worked for all numbers up to some really large number. Perhaps even just some large number of spot checks. And statistically maybe that's a functional approach?
And that's what it feels like now. We have the "old school" developers who consider CS to be equivalent to math, and we have these other people like you mention who are happy if the code seems to work 'enough'. "Hackers" have been around for decades but in order to get anything real done, they generally had to be smart enough to understand the code themselves. Now we're seeing the rise of the unskilled hacker, thanks to AI...is this creating the next generation of script kiddies?
Yes, they don't care about the contents as long as the code appears to work correctly in the happy path, they ignore edge cases and bugs an mark the ticket as solved and move on, leaving an broken, unmaintainable mess in their wake.
These are exactly the types of people who LOVE ai because it produces code of similar quality an functionality that they would produce by hand.
I dunno, I've picked up my share of hitchhikers and to me it wasn't about being a trade, it's about sharing presence and our stories. Not a transaction, but just sharing.
One time I was stopped on a single lane highway in the mountains, in driving rain, as a power pole was blocking the road. A fellow commuter was in the same boat, but he was on a motorcycle. I invited him in my car and we just chilled and shared some light conversation. No trade, nothing gained besides someone offering a little shelter to another.
Sure, a US invasion of Iran would undoubtedly lead to good things. And how can you say the Kurds are friends of the USA (I'm presuming you mean friends of the USA) given how many times they've been abandoned?
Just take a look at what happened to Libya, sometimes removing a "bad person" will cause a far worse situation to evolve. Like literal human slavery.
I will never cease to be amazed at the amnesia that arises when folks in power decide now is a good time to sell a war to the people.
In Iran they have had several police forces join the protestors at this point. Hopefully its a theme that continues and includes the military.
It only takes about 30% of the population supporting the regime plus military intervention to hold onto power. For some time now it seems that they've been below the 30% mark.
Israel is a terrorist regime that commits genocide against Palestinians. What use is it if the ones fighting it are terrorists as well? In your hypothetical world where Iran is the strongest regional power, what does that accomplish? The Palestinians trade Israeli and Hamas's oppression for being a protectorate of the Islamic Republic of Iran? I never really understood this line of thinking.
All correct. But something needs to be frontloaded.
1. Even if removing <bad government> would be good for that country, that doesn’t give some other state the right to do it. We let these entities get away with murder because they are our friends and they have the biggest guns, that’s it.
2. Always interrogate the real reasons why a state is doing it.
Now only after that we get to the facts like all those times it ended horribly for the people that <state> was supposed to help.
Panama was on 1989 and Venezuela situation it's closer to that, than the middle East countries, We are united in this, more than 80% are against the current government and we even voted him out. There is not religious divide as it happens in those countries, even by ethnicity most people are just mixed.
This is a longstanding debate in landscape photography communities - virtually everyone edits, but there’s real debate as to what the line is and what is too much. There does seem to be an idea of being faithful to the original experience, which I subscribe to, but that’s certainly not universal.
My understanding is that no one used hubs anymore, so your collision domain goes from a number of machines on a hub to a dedicated channel between the switch and the machine. There obviously won’t be collisions if you’re the only one talking and you’re able to do full duplex communications without issue.
Hubs still exist(ed), but nobody implemented half-duplex or CSMA from gigabit ethernet on up (I can't remember if it was technically part of the gig-e spec or not)
"No one" and "no new installations" are not the same. There are many many many millions of hubs out there in the world. The statement, as written, is just ludicrously naive, entirely disconnected from reality.
No, I don’t think that’s it. Almost everyone one I associate with does similar kinds of work, and I don’t see that same willingness to expose them and others to undue risk like that.
The way you make such broad assumptions and jump right into highly charged politics with nary a connection really does make me wonder about your emotional well being.
You don't see the connection because you weren't invited to participate in numerous discussions where these connections are made explicitly via detailed analysis.
I have more to do than refresh HN all day, going for brevity here.
Your expectation others must explicitly connect all the dots for you makes me question your grasp of reality. Most people alive are going about their lives unconcerned with your existence altogether.
When you're so out of touch as to not know who Kent Beck is, these questions hardly matter.
The thrust of the issue is that: when used suitably, AI tools can increase the rate of learning such that it changes the economics of investments in juniour developers - in a good way, to the contrary of how these tools have been discussed in the mainstream. That is an interesting take, and worthy of discussion.
Your appeal to authority here is out of place here and clearly uninformed, thus the downvotes.
Some might (most might?), those aren't the ones we're interested in.
Just as some might pull the answers from the back of the textbook, the interesting ones are the kids who want to find out why certain solutions are the way they are.
Then again I could be wrong, I try hard to stay away from the shithose that is the modern social media tech landscape (TikTok, Insta, and friends) so I'm probably WAY out of touch (and I prefer it that way).
> If you can't see this, I have to seriously question your competence as an engineer in the first place tbh.
I can't agree more strongly. I work with a number of folks who say concerning things along the lines of what you describe above (or just slightly less strong). The trust in a system that is not fully trustworthy is really shocking, but it only seems to come from a particular kind of person. It's hard to describe, but I'd describe it as: people that are less concerned with the contents of the code versus the behaviour of the program. It's a strange dichotomy, and surprising every time.
I mean, if you don't get the economics of a reasonably factored codebase vs one that's full of hacks and architecturally terrible compromises - you're in for a VERY bad time. Perhaps even a company-ending bad time. I've seen that happen in the old days, and I expect we're in the midst of seeing a giant wave of failures due to unsustainably maintained codebases. But we probably won't be able to tell, startups have been mostly failing the entire time.
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