Comment by sanex
1 month ago
I've been writing code professionally for a decade but I've never written so much code in my free time because I can just vibe code it all. I wouldn't do it at work and I probably wouldn't trust a juniors vibes as much as my own but no tools have made me feel quite so powerful.
I never tried vibe code as described in this article, but I could see where it breaks. Initially, code works. Eventually, there's a bug, and the LLM isn't able to fix it. At that stage, you're on your own with a potentially large codebase which is totally new to you.
Even on small projects, sometimes I'm tired, I just try to get the LLM do some refactoring for me or write a couple of tests. First, whatever the LLM writes, it's going to code review and I'm not submitting code that I haven't read and understood just to have colleagues complaining. Second, if the code doesn't work, it gets frustrating. For LLMs to help, I like to have a pretty clear idea of what I want, how the "right" code looks like so I can give more indications.
The idea is "Rewriting is faster than debugging", so if something breaks, you ask LLM to rewrite it
Not a fan of it.
Yeah it's totally a situation where obviously I can write it myself if I had the time so I just correct it as it goes. I also give it lots of guidelines on what I'm looking for but after some setup I can just watch TV and check on it every couple minutes.
Vibe coding works for experienced developers who give very detailed instructions including edge cases and potential issues or solutions. It is almost code already as it has already included all important code business logic (leaving the simple parts for Ai to fill in ). It is a maintenance disaster for junior developers or non-coders.
it's definitely nice for prototypes, but nothing more complex.
I used to feel that way but my perspective over the last 6 months has changed greatly. You can absolutely build very complex things in this style
That's actually not a contradiction.
As far as I can tell, you can build very complex prototypes. But unless these prototypes can be both trusted and maintained, that's all they are.
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I wouldn't trust vibe coding to a junior. This would be a recipe for desaster. It's a skill best paired with a very senior dev who can correctly assess the output of the AI.
show me an example of such a complex thing obtained after just writing prompts
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