[cachvico]

I use it all the time, and it has accelerated my output massively.

Now, I don't trust the output - I review everything, and it often goes wrong. You have to know how to use it. But I would never go back. Often it comes up with more elegant solutions than I would have. And when you're working with a new platform, or some unfamiliar library that it already knows, it's an absolute godsend.

I'm also damn proud of my own hand-crafted code, but to avoid LLMs out of principal? That's just luddite.

20+ years of experience across game dev, mobile and web apps, in case you feel it relevant.

[ericwood]

I have a hard time being sold on “yea it’s wrong a lot, also you have to spend more time than you already do on code review.”

Getting to sit down and write the code is the most enjoyable part of the job, why would I deprive myself of that? By the time the problem has been defined well enough to explain it to an LLM sitting down and writing the code is typically very simple.

[tptacek]

You're giving the game away when you talk about the joy LLMs are robbing from you. I think we all intuit why people don't like the idea of big parts of their jobs being automated away! But that's not an argument on the merits. Our entire field is premised on automating people's jobs away, so it's always a little rich to hear programmers kvetching about it being done to them.

[pizza]

The parts worth thinking about you still think about. The parts that you’ve done a million times before you delegate so you can spend better and greater effort on the parts worth thinking about.

[woah]

I'm confused when people say that LLMs take away the fun or creativity of programming. LLMs are only really good at the tedious parts.

[dgs_sgd]

For me it's typically wrong not in a fundamental way but a trivial way like bad import paths or function calls, like if I forgot to give it relevant context.

And yet the time it takes me to use the LLM and correct its output is usually faster than not using it at all.

Over time I've developed a good sense for what tasks it succeeds at (or is only trivially wrong) and what tasks it's just not up for.

[YeGoblynQueenne]

>> I use it all the time, and it has accelerated my output massively.

Like how McDonalds makes a lot of burgers fast and they are very successful so that's all we really care about?

[cachvico]

Terrible analogy. I don't commit jank. If the LLM comes out with nonsense, I'll fix it first.

[timewizard]

> "and it has accelerated my output massively."

The folly of single ended metrics.

> but to avoid LLMs out of principal? That's just luddite.

Do you double check that the LLM hasn't magically recreated someone else's copyrighted code? That's just irresponsible in certain contexts.

> in case you feel it relevant.

Of course it's relevant. If a 19 year old with 1 year of driving experience tries to sell me a car using their personal anecdote as a metric I'd be suspicious. If their only salient point is that "it gets me to where I'm going faster!" I'd be doubly suspicious.

[xvector]

> Do you double check that the LLM hasn't magically recreated someone else's copyrighted code?

I frankly do not care, and I expect LLMs to become such ubiquitous table-stakes that I don't think anyone will really care in the long run.

[cachvico]

Add "Without compromising quality then"!