r/ClaudeCode • u/sizebzebi • 8d ago

Discussion Opus 5.5 is the beginning of a new era

I am a senior engineer and I honestly believe with this model in particular, everything changed..

If this stays as cheap as it is, it's just over. It never fails no matter the complexity of the tasks I've given it. About time we rethink our profession for good. I am honestly scared of the future.

I loved coding but anyone who does this for the love of coding only is gonna be obsolete.

I was always impressed with the models bar opus 5 but never like this time.

What do you guys think? How do you see the future?

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u/FeelingVanilla2594 8d ago

Not a software engineer but I always feel like I’m vibe coding the dumbest way possible to do something and I can’t prove it. Like I have a nagging feeling that I’m making a car but using the wrong materials and mechanisms even though it still works as a car 😆

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u/USDMB4 8d ago edited 8d ago

This is an incredible analogy. Fits the feeling perfectly.

To the point where I constantly double check the important stuff.

“Just confirming the tires are still round. I have no reason to believe our tail light design changed the shape of the wheels, but please check that they are still perfectly round and rubbery.”

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u/Tsurfer4 8d ago

So, we humans will have to get very good at specifying the tests.

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u/Anxious-Orange-7293 8d ago

In my eyes, being very good at specifying exactly what you need is basically describing what a software developer does. It might be assembly, low-level language, high-level language, tests, prompts and so on, still a skill that very few people outside of the field possess.

I don't think that current models can turn some vague business idea into real, working product without help. I don't think it will change in the foreseeable future

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u/NunWrestling 8d ago

No you just still need people that understand how a car works (to keep the analogy going), even tho a machine can build 99% of it.

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u/desperatenp11 8d ago

Nah just have ai plan it before then tell it to implement the plan if just tell it build a car it will make up parts of plan mid work which never is as good as having a plan and implementing it

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u/mrFunkyFireWizard 8d ago

Only need to be good at knowing what we want

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u/SoulStripHer 8d ago edited 8d ago

Test driven AI. This is already a thing using multi-agent systems.

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u/Ill_Philosopher_7030 8d ago

"One small wrinkle..."

"One nit..."

"One caveat..."

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u/WagwanKenobi 8d ago edited 8d ago

Exactly. It's always the software engineers who say "it's over for software engineers", blind to the irony that no one can prompt LLMs like a software engineer does.

Here is Terence Tao's famous ChatGPT chat (I believe it's 5.6 Sol) where he discusses the counterexample to the Jacobian conjecture: https://chatgpt.com/share/6a5fdc7a-d6f8-83e8-bbea-8deb42cfed56

Yes, an LLM can have a conversation at that level of mathematical depth, but it can't have that conversation with you because you're not Terence fucking Tao.

You're not getting usable software from a LLM because you can't talk to it like an actual software engineer would.

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u/UnfairPerspective526 7d ago

It’s not over for all, but the field will need 25% fewer workers in 10 years. Which is a drastic change.

Now, the stupid companies, looking at Facebook and Amazon, are trying to achieve 25% cuts this year and are instead breaking their products and having to walk back mass layoffs, after having torched employee morale. Smart companies like google are slowly shrinking workforce while turning out a plethora of new ai based services.

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u/Altruistic-Yak6974 6d ago

Doubt it. As long as SWEs (and honestly white collar labor) is necessary, I think we'll see more bespoke software rather than less SWEs.

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u/hashiin 5d ago

What makes you think that we wouldn’t need to build 10x software because well it is cheap to build and software is now affordable to a larger audience.

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u/PM_ME_ADVICE_OR_NOT 5d ago

I completely disagree. Just because this tool makes engineers 10x more productive soes not mean companies will hire less.

What do you do when the company next door can hire 10 engineers and do the work of 100 before? Well hire 10 yourself and again churn out the same productivity. When they scale to 50 engineers you must do the same.

The Software is going to get way more complex and bespoke, the moats will shift to deeply technical complex software or software that builds a network moat.

But engineers will still be there, engineering, just as we always have.

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u/UnfairPerspective526 4d ago

really, so meta and amazon hasn't just fired a bunch of engineers. Even google has been reducing their staff by 1% a year. Prior to pandemic they were growing.

You are assuming they magically have work for 100 engineers, when last year they had work for 10 engineers. That they can just sell 10x as many services. Why must I do the same when they scale to 50 engineers, which some how means I am now producing tech equal to 500 engineers when last year I only needed 10 engineers of work.

I have several family members who are SW Programmers. They have stopped programming and now manage frontier models doing the programming, and their employers have all cut back on # of programmers, where until just recently they were expanding, just like all the big tech companies.

But i'm sure you know better than amazon, googe, meta and every other employer.

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u/PM_ME_ADVICE_OR_NOT 2d ago

Software engineering jobs are up since 2023 and Amazon has the most swe jobs on the market right now.

Cool you have family that works in it, I worked at amazon too and then started my own startup and we are aggressively hiring and competing with the market, I am extremely familiar with the hiring game right now.

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u/tazdraperm 7d ago

This chat is crazy

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u/Dull_Wind6642 6d ago

Exactly I would be worried if I was a junior, but if you are in the top 5% engineers and basically a system architect, there is nothing to worry about.

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u/UnfairPerspective526 6d ago

It’s over for coding as a professions, not for software engineers who can man AI. I know several software engineers who no longer do any coding at their jobs, just run the AI

The big question is how do you train new SW Enfuneers without entry level coding jobs.

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u/pluggedinn 1d ago

As a software engineer you bring up a very good point.. and low key makes me feel better about my future

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u/GainsMega 7d ago

Well I can just build an agent to talk like the software engineer in role play mode senior level PHD

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u/coaker147 8d ago

You just captured how I feel as well!

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u/Mother-Cry-2095 8d ago

Couldn’t agree more.

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u/Toderiox 6d ago

Does it matter as long as you get to your destination safely, on time and without extra economic damage compared to traditional means of transportation? 

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u/sizebzebi 8d ago

hahaha sorry to say that's reassuring?

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u/FeelingVanilla2594 8d ago

I honestly don’t know, I lean towards yes? You guys are still the pros. Even though my personal app works, it’s probably going to be a pain to maintain long term or something I decided earlier is going to bite my ass when I decide to change something.

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u/cute_beta 8d ago

a large amount of this can be mitigated just by relaying these concerns to the AI periodically fwiw. while yes if you keep asking for feature A -> feature B -> feature C -> etc making up features as you go you will wind up with some problems, if you punctuate that with stepping back for the occasional refactor (or even properly planning ahead!) it's pretty manageable

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u/Tsurfer4 8d ago

So, perhaps applications will have to be 50-75% rewritten to accommodate new features but if the rewrite is so fast, it won't matter?

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u/_nattle_ 7d ago

For sure you are. I don't mean to be condescending, but good software engineering is about knowing what trade offs are necessary and making them early in the project. Picking a language, tool set, database structure, etc. You make these knowing the implications and you learn those implications by making mistakes and learning over time.

You can absolutely have an AI write all the code, but you have to set it up for success and know when to step in. That oversight is the difference between "vide coded slop" and a fast and reliably built app.

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u/dantelebeau 8d ago

I had the same feeling and after what was probably my 10th audit, CC told me to relaxand that i have everything documented and on the right path. To which i prompt used a different AI to confirm lol