Comment by simonw
1 month ago
But I am considering the context of each one. It's just quicker not to modify the code by hand.
I'm going to use a human comparison here, even though I try to avoid them. It's like having a team of interns who you explain the refactoring to, send them off to help get it done and review their work at the end.
If the interns are screwing it up you notice and update your instructions to them so they can try again.
I guess. And I don't mean that as a jab at you, I read a lot of your content and agree with quite a bit of it - I'm just personally conflicted here still.
I've worked in a couple positions where the software I've written does actually deal directly with the physical safety of people (medical, aviation, defense) - which I know is rare for a lot of folks here.
Applying that line of thinking to those positions... I find it makes me a tad itchy.
I think there's a lot of software where I don't really mind much (ex - almost every SaaS service under the sun, most consumer grade software, etc).
And I'm absolutely using these tools in those positions - so I'm not really judging that. I'm just wondering if there's a line we should be considering somewhere here.
I've avoided working directly on safety critical software throughout my career because the idea that my mistakes could hurt people frightens me.
I genuinely feel less nervous about working on those categories of software if I can bring coding agents along for the ride, because I'm confident I can use those tools to help me write software that's safer and less likely to have critical bugs.
Armed with coding agents I can get to 100% test coverage, and perform things like fuzz testing, and get second and third opinions on designs, and have conversations about failure patterns that I may not personally have considered.
For me, coding agents represent the ability for me to use techniques that were previously constrained by my time. I get more time now.