I'm building a zork-like dungeon explorer for vibe coded projects. Ok, the zork interface is not that important, but it adds an extra layer of fun, and does reflect the reality of how I dig through a codebase to understand it. You start at the entry point and start exploring each code path to build a map of what is going on, taking notes as you go, and using tools if you're lucky to get a sense of the overall structure. You can also go up and down a level of abstraction like going up and down a dungeon.
It incorporates also complaints from a static analyzer for Python and Javascript that detects 90+ vibe slop anti-patterns using mostly ASTs, and in some cases AST + small language models. The complaints give the local class and methods a sense of how much pain they are in, so I give the code a sense of its own emotional state.
I also build data flow schematics of the entire system so I can visualize the project as a wire diagram, which is very helpful to quickly see what is going on.
That sounds neat! I especially like "I give the code a sense of its own emotional state". I can just imagine a function crying "Why did they use that algorithm ?? Why so much spaghetti ?? I'm soo ugly ..Why Why Why" :-D
That would probably motivate me to fix the poor thing, just so I don't feel like I'm torturing it! :-D
I don't feel like the abstraction away from assembly language resulted in fewer software engineering jobs. Nor do I feel like Java's virtual machine resulted in fewer systems engineering jobs. Somehow I don't feel that writing in English rather than pure logic will result in fewer engineering problems either. A lot more actually. But at least we'll get the requirements out of users into something concrete faster.
What is definitely going to be abundantly clear is just how much better machines can get at creating correct code and how bad each of us truly is at this. That's an ego hit.
The loving effort an artisan puts into a perfect pot still has wabi sabi from the human error; whereas a factory produced pot is way more perfect and possesses both a Quality from closeness to Idealism and an eerieness from its unnaturalness.
However, the demand for artisan pottery has niched out compared to Ikea bowls, so that's just how it is.
In my case I have set up the agent is the repo. The repo texts compose the agent’s memory. Changes to the repo require the agent to approve.
Repos also message each other and coordinate plans and changes with each other and make feature requests which the repo agent then manages.
So I keep the agents’ semantically compressed memories as part of the repo as well as the original transcripts because often they lose coherence and reviewing every user submitted prompt realigns the specs and stories and requirements.
The only place MCP made sense for me, so I thought, was to give my Claude Web agents access to the same cli tools my Claude Code agents had. In this context, agents don't have shells.
However, then I discovered MCP servers on Claude Web are forced onto my laptop for Claude Code, which is very confusing. I don't know if there is a way to stop that, but it has messed up my Claude Code agents.
Is this experience common, and is there a known way to stop this?
Agreed. We are still in a capital crunch so overhiring is out of fashion. People don’t remember the early 90s or the dot.bust when the same things were said.
Kraft 1977 Programmers and Managers talked about this if I recall. Still the best alternate take on our industry I have ever read.
The most likely explanation for "AI layoffs" is not that AI has caused a dramatic jump in productivity - its more that managers are running out of creativity in relation to revenue-generating and cost-reducing projects and henceforth have no use for the surplus of labour. Its much easier to maximize the stock price in the short-term by riding the 'AI' wave.
There seems to be some nonsensical belief that there exists this endless stream of positive NPV projects to take. No... reality is not like that.
That’s a strong point. I interpret that: Covid created needs that weren’t permanent and also caused overinvestment to address digitalization and remote life needs to support lockdown as well as predictions for a permanent change in the future. Either way a lot of the work to be done in software is done for a while.
Why would there be a lack of original ideas? People who are born to code so to speak will do it. Information wants to be free as the saying goes. It only takes one time for an innovation for it to be to copied everywhere.
We don’t need the same volume of developers to have the same or faster speed of innovation.
And conversely if there is stagnation there is a capital opportunity to out compete it and so there will be a human desire to do the work.
Tl;Dr. People like doing stuff and achieving. They will continue to do stuff.
ps it’s too much to claim other people don’t experience creative ideas using AI. You don’t really know that’s true. It hasn’t been my experience as I have had the capability and capacity to complete ideas on my back burner for decades and move onto the next thing.
That’s the big scary point at the crux of all of this - you’ve had decades without the tooling to develop instincts. Nobody knows whether it’s possible to develop instincts with the tooling or what those instincts will look like. Creativity takes a degree of skill to execute on and the concern is that we’re potentially graduating people to painting the ceiling of the Sistine chapel before they’ve even learned to sketch.
At minimum, our current generation of leaders will have to get much better at managing resources and building people up. We have to up our games and build environments where the pursuit of deep understanding is permissible. Unfortunately with the current hiring issues, it’s totally understandable that young developers are scared to take time on tickets.
I can't repair my car, which used to be the hallmark of technical masculine skill in the era of Grease the musical, because mechanical maintenance is not primary in my lifetime. Nor do I have any idea how to manage a farm. I think the kids will be fine. On the other hand, I fear I will not survive once my Internet connection goes out.
That analogy brought another one to my mind: groceries.
We used to hunt and grow most of what we needed. For various reasons (good and bad) we are now completely removed from the whole process. That allowed us to prosper and evolve by focusing on other things. We took all of what we knew about growing/hunting, grouped it together with industrialization and abstracted it as "everything that happens before". It's a big shortcut - which is a big win for "other things" we may want to do.
AI is a lot like that. But the danger is that AI (or its dependencies - isn't Claude down this morning?) can disappear tomorrow, and then where does that leave us? It's as if all the animals and vegetation were controlled by OpenFoodstock.
I can't be the only one thinking we cannot let that happen.
It incorporates also complaints from a static analyzer for Python and Javascript that detects 90+ vibe slop anti-patterns using mostly ASTs, and in some cases AST + small language models. The complaints give the local class and methods a sense of how much pain they are in, so I give the code a sense of its own emotional state.
I also build data flow schematics of the entire system so I can visualize the project as a wire diagram, which is very helpful to quickly see what is going on.
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