Rise of the machines - AI replacing programmers in 3 - 5 years.

[abhijit]

Deepseek, qwen, grok, gemini, chatGpt and the gang are ready to write code, write test cases and document like pros. Looks like the low-level coding kingdom is about to get a new, silicon-based management. I suspect our jobs as programmers are short lived.

Care to discuss?

[gaouser]

Claude is very good at VB6 imo. Others confuse it with VB.NET, don't worry nobody would train much on VB6 other than Claude, were slightly safe

[Niya]

I said this at least once here on these boards. I'll say it again: This is a good thing for programmers.

AI cannot replace programmers because AI cannot think creatively. AI is really good at doing grunt work. Programmers can use it to boost productivity by giving it all the grunt work like writing boilerplate code. This can free the programmer to do more of what he does best which is to think creatively.

Programmers also use Google a lot as a reference for information. AI is far better in this role than classic search engines as you can hone in on exactly what you want instead of having to wade through mountains of text just to find the paragraph of information you really want. The only disadvantage here is that AIs tend to hallucinate, so you have to double check whatever it tells you. However, this will only improve over time.

[gaouser]

I said this at least once here on these boards. I'll say it again: This is a good thing for programmers.

AI cannot replace programmers because AI cannot think creatively. AI is really good at doing grunt work. Programmers can use it to boost productivity by giving it all the grunt work like writing boilerplate code. This can free the programmer to do more of what he does best which is to think creatively.

Programmers also use Google a lot as a reference for information. AI is far better in this role than classic search engines as you can hone in on exactly what you want instead of having to wade through mountains of text just to find the paragraph of information you really want. The only disadvantage here is that AIs tend to hallucinate, so you have to double check whatever it tells you. However, this will only improve over time.

Agreed. I try to not overuse AI, most times I use it is boring JSON parsing that removes your sanity, or websockets.

[FunkyDexter]

AI cannot replace programmers because AI cannot think creatively

For once we agree on something. AI is very good at writing algorithms and very bad at creating systems.

I do worry that the area AI is good at is the area typically occupied by Junior programmers, meaning it's rise might close the traditional entry point to our industry. That could have some bad side effects.

[PlausiblyDamp]

For once we agree on something. AI is very good at writing algorithms and very bad at creating systems.

I do worry that the area AI is good at is the area typically occupied by Junior programmers, meaning it's rise might close the traditional entry point to our industry. That could have some bad side effects.

The problem is that often junior programmers are pretty good at writing code, they are not good at understanding testing, security, performance, governance, maintenance, business needs, seeing a problem in context, or best practices. Getting to be an experienced dev involves struggling through these things, making mistakes and learning as you go - hopefully with a decent team that can help you learn.

AI isn't getting this additional help, and is just regurgitating whatever it finds on SO, Medium, or whatever - even worse AI is now causing a lot more poor quality code to make it onto the internet to train the next generation of AI models as well.

Relying on AI is going to cause the next generation of devs to no longer think through a problem themselves, after all writing code is the end result of solving a problem - that is what good devs are all about, problem solving.

[gaouser]

The problem is that often junior programmers are pretty good at writing code, they are not good at understanding testing, security, performance, governance, maintenance, business needs, seeing a problem in context, or best practices. Getting to be an experienced dev involves struggling through these things, making mistakes and learning as you go - hopefully with a decent team that can help you learn.

AI isn't getting this additional help, and is just regurgitating whatever it finds on SO, Medium, or whatever - even worse AI is now causing a lot more poor quality code to make it onto the internet to train the next generation of AI models as well.

Relying on AI is going to cause the next generation of devs to no longer think through a problem themselves, after all writing code is the end result of solving a problem - that is what good devs are all about, problem solving.

I often write the barebones parts myself, If its Win32, I give the windowing fully to AI as I don't have a good memory and MSDN Online is VERY lacking. I find myself better at bugfixing ever since I discovered that VB6 DID have breakpoint a few months ago...

[gaouser]

It helps when function gets called but quits for no reason, mostly due to On Error Resume Next on a file I/O function. I don't use OERN much(unlike me from a few years ago) but I use it for JSON-parsing as its pretty prone to crashing but often doesn't have much effect on how the code runs as it often crashes on unused parameters etc. And also for Form_Resize as it just defaults below 0 values to 0 without writing more code.

[abhijit]

For once we agree on something. AI is very good at writing algorithms and very bad at creating systems.

I do worry that the area AI is good at is the area typically occupied by Junior programmers, meaning it's rise might close the traditional entry point to our industry. That could have some bad side effects.

This is what I think. A project that required 5 programmers can now be done with just 2 with the help of AI. So, manpower reduction is definitely going to happen in the next few years. There are companies that have stopped hiring programmers because of their reliance on AI. It cannot create systems, but the gamut of ideas it can present is amazing. In our workplace, we have NFL pool every season. This was maintained in an excel file.
I was able to make a website using ASP .NEt in a day with the help of AI. The AI also wrote all of the test classes. It also pointed out the gaps that I needed to address.

[FunkyDexter]

When users can accurately give us requirements, that will be the day that I fear AI will take over my job. Until then, there will definitely be shifts in employment practices and shifts in the type of work developers do, but there will still be job security.

You need to become a contractor (if you haven't already). When you're a permy, shifting requirements are a chore. When you're a contractor, they're a pending invoice.