Comment by ryandrake
5 hours ago
I noticed the same thing, but wasn't able to put it into words before reading that. Been experimenting with LLM-based coding just so I can understand it and talk intelligently about it (instead of just being that grouchy curmudgeon), and the thought in the back of my mind while using Claude Code is always:
"I got into programming because I like programming, not whatever this is..."
Yes, I'm building stupid things faster, but I didn't get into programming because I wanted to build tons of things. I got into it for the thrill of defining a problem in terms of data structures and instructions a computer could understand, entering those instructions into the computer, and then watching victoriously while those instructions were executed.
If I was intellectually excited about telling something to do this for me, I'd have gotten into management.
Same same. Writing the actual code is always a huge motivator behind my side projects. Yes, producing the outcome is important, but the journey taken to get there is a lot of fun for me.
I used Claude Code to implement a OpenAI 4o-vision powered receipt scanning feature in an expense tracking tool I wrote by hand four years ago. It did it in two or three shots while taking my codebase into account.
It was very neat, and it works great [^0], but I can't latch onto the idea of writing code this way. Powering through bugs while implementing a new library or learning how to optimize my test suite in a new language is thrilling.
Unfortunately (for me), it's not hard at all to see how the "builders" that see code as a means to an end would LOVE this, and businesses want builders, not crafters.
In effect, knowing the fundamentals is getting devalued at a rate I've never seen before.
Same. This kind of coding feels like it got rid of the building aspect of programming that always felt nice, and it replaced it entirely with business logic concerns, product requirements, code reviews, etc. All the stuff I can generally take or leave. It's like I'm always in a meeting.
>If I was intellectually excited about telling something to do this for me, I'd have gotten into management.
Exactly this. This is the simplest and tersest way of explaining it yet.
What I have enjoyed about programming is being able to get the computer to do exactly what I want. The possibilities are bounded by only what I can conceive in my mind. I feel like with AI that can happen faster.
> get the computer to do exactly what I want.
> with AI that can happen faster.
well, not exactly that.
Funny you say that. Because I have never enjoyed management as much as being hands on and directly solving problems.
So maybe our common ground is that we are direct problem solvers. :-)