> We are going from the era of manual, line-by-line mental model transcription to one where software engineers can focus on data structures, software architecture and algorithms.
Focusing on data structures, architecture and algorithms is what competency in programming has looked like since forever. Building systems out of smaller pieces gets you there.
If your complaint above is that you were struggling with syntax and reading documentation, one might ask if you failed to progress past beginner levels, and now AI is just your cheat-code?
Some projects have fantastic documentation. Qt comes to mind. The experience of writing Qt is a pleasure because I can always jump to the doc for whatever class I'm dealing with and find what I'm looking for immediately. Also every argument type is well-linked in every signature so it's easy to follow and understand everything you're dealing with.
> Focusing on data structures, architecture and algorithms is what competency in programming has looked like since forever
yes, being able to bang out leetcode hard from head on an interview on paper matters so much... oh wait. it does not.
in the real world, outside of interview questions, it hardly matters. when it comes there, I'll optimizite it, but getting the first system up and running in a way I want is way more fun & challenging. need a lock free ringbuffer? I'll look up what's the latest way to build it. or just ask my AI.
> yes, being able to bang out leetcode hard from head on an interview on paper matters so much... oh wait. it does not.
That's about reciting standard data structures like stack and queues. I think parent is talking more about the design of primitives for the domain of the software. That requires creativity and insight.
I think you are not interpreting GP in the most charitable way. He simply said that not having to manually write all the code lets him spend his energy on bigger things. That is different from "struggling with syntax".
It is the same. I mean many mainstream languages made thinking in datastructures hard. Not a coincidence why functional languages, Haskell, F#, OCAML, Scala, Clojure, LISP, etc. had their enthusiast, as they felt just like what you claim.
The datastructures already did the heavy lifting. The syntax was not something to struggle with, but it was the natural way to stick the bits together.
JavaScript for one never gave me this feeling, and I always felt that either the language, or the libraries, but something was always a struggle to overcome. (Python too... seriously, working with collections is a pain in the "pythonic" way for someone who has experienced LINQ... and for most line of business apps it is all about working with collections.)
> You would think that an engineering school would be wiser...
Schools are a business run by administrative staff who make purchasing decisions to solve business problems. Schools love to reduce billable teaching hours through online coursework, which invites academic dishonesty from students, and paying for honorlock is a way to achieve that reduction in expenditure, rather than paying tutors to supervise exams in person.
We're exactly in that era of insanity that someone will use agent drivel development to cobble together a browser from existing browser sources in exchange for thousands of dollars of compute. Will it be standards conformant? No. Will it have security issues? Yes.
The AdminVM is based on Fedora and has systemd, but it has no network and you you shouldn't run anything there. Unless you think that systemd is actively malicious and specifically targets Qubes, any vulnerabilities in it are not exploitable.
It's likely that regular Fastmail users are subsidising their AI costs. I've talked to several people who were a bit shocked when Fastmail decided to complicate their offering with the current hyped trash.
Online tools to simplify this process like Perseus have existed for at least 15 years, and you could view original texts side by side with English for comparison, and original words have all their cross-references hyperlinked etc. All maintained by academics committed to rigorous and nuanced approaches to translation.
Ancient Library is some vibecoded alternative that the LLM translation it uses will be incorrect. Color me unimpressed.
Focusing on data structures, architecture and algorithms is what competency in programming has looked like since forever. Building systems out of smaller pieces gets you there.
If your complaint above is that you were struggling with syntax and reading documentation, one might ask if you failed to progress past beginner levels, and now AI is just your cheat-code?
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