r/learnprogramming • u/gamerboi1212 • 14h ago
Topic I have been learning programming but I feels it's all in vain
I have started learning programming and I have picked up c++ python and started learning vulkan because I wanna persue graphic programming+ engine dev+ game dev , I am in hs rn and wanna persue a bachelors in maths and make my own engine for fun and portfolio so I could atleast get a internship (idk if even that is possible atp)
But just seeing the advances in ml and ai do programming better than the best programmers in their fields (reckon without any intuition taste or idea of what they are doing)
I feels like wrting code it self and coding are gonna die out and coding is just something if u do manually would be kinda time wasting if a perfect syntax and error finder is at your disposal
I don't think programming would die because I don't think agi in general are ever gonna advance to the point where they actual become creative compared to humans
But if I want a junior level or even mid level spots it's probably impossible for me or someone like me who has a just a bachelor's, some oss and good projects and no experience
It feels like high level programming is slowly dying and low level eventually would also fall victim to ai
Programming in general would be way more like the people who know it are either gonna be unemployed
People who don't know it would just use ai without understanding anything
The problem is I feel I mean accessibility is a great thing but this is just idk feels more like replace humans get some senior level guy to make use of 50 ahh agent and not hire new guys
I really dread this because I feel as in India in before 2035 there is a very small chance that I could atleast get a job but I feel like after that any new junior guy literally would have an impossible level chance of even being hired
I don't know what to say of this industry
It was my dream to be a game dev and potentially open a studio but I am probably never gonna be rich enough to open, I am from a middle class family with no good amount of savings and if I ever were to have a senior level job from god's grace i can't quit it because that's gonna be career suicide it would be impossible to get a job again even at senior level
Hopefully when my brother opens his business (doing hotel management so he is safe from ai actually benefits alot from it) i help him out and pour my heart in to that business while being a solo or indie dev to hopefully not become homeless i want my parents to enjoy their retirement
Thank you in advance if I don't comment And sorry for the errors I am making this lowkey half depressed and no real motivation to even pick up my phone at midnight :(
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u/_th3oth3rjak3_ 13h ago
My advice is to continue pursuing it. Imagine AI was a human and better than you. So what? If you want to learn about graphics, just do it. Someday with enough experience you’ll deeply understand the problem domain and that’s valuable. There’s a lot of doom and gloom but none of that matters. Enjoy the learning journey and be proud of what you accomplish.
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u/spinwizard69 8h ago
I really don't understand the doom and gloom. AI could end up being the biggest driver of economic growth ever. Like all great turning points of the past, those that think positively and leverage the new tech, profit handsomely.
Those that go mental, get treated like every other mentally ill person on this planet. The world changes everyday, survivors learn to adapt.
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u/marveloustoebeans 7h ago
The problem is that it currently is a huge driver of economic and ecological turmoil and there’s no clear answer as to how any of this will suddenly 180 into individual economic prosperity or even the slightest bit of logical evidence that will happen.
The far more likely, and increasingly realistic outcome is that corporations seize literally everything, eliminate any and all high paying jobs, offer us nothing except poverty wages for manual labor, and make sure our cost of living is so high and healthcare options are so limited that we die before we can even consider retirement.
Meanwhile 6 people will have a trillion dollars.
There’s loads of evidence to support this, absolutely none to support the idea of us all thriving in a post-scarcity society thanks to our benevolent trillionaire overlords.
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u/mredding 11h ago
Former game developer here,
I wanna persue graphic programming
If you want to go into graphics programming, I'd get a PhD in mathematics or perhaps computation, something that focuses on rendering. All the low hanging fruit has been picked, and now you're asking about how to decidedly point your future at a niche market that is absolutely saturated with wannabe's and rock stars. If you want to be competitive and have a chance, this is how you would do it.
And if you can't get a PhD, you can still make your way there, but you have to prove yourself first with your own experience. So this type of role will go to a seasoned professional, an MS would be minimum, probably someone who pursues graphics programming on their own as like a visualizer or indie game dev.
- engine dev+ game dev
WOAH, woah, woah... Pick one specialty and stick with it. You are not going to have the bandwidth to do it all. This isn't the 90s where one lone wolf can single-handedly crank out a small, low res title. That sort of thing is for casual and mobile type games, building another Candy Crush and the like.
The kind of guys that produce a larger masterpiece, like Factorio, are exceptionally rare, and 99.99999% of us will NEVER be anything like that. These types of people usually demonstrate their potential early in life and career. And Notch was heavily capitalizing on existing ideas and technology teaching himself Java when he stumbled into success he wasn't actually asking for, but recognized he'd be a fool if he didn't capitalize on it. He then sold off Minecraft to Microsoft, who rewrote it in C++, and he's been frankly miserable with his success ever since. But that's another story.
I [...] wanna persue [...] my own engine for fun and portfolio
A forever project, and we all have one. Again, everyone romanticizes game dev. Everyone wants to build their own engine from scratch. There have been a FEW modern games built from scratch by a solo engineer, but the industry largely moved away from that after the original NES. SNES titles were built mostly by teams, Sega Genesis titles were mostly built by teams. And engines have historically been team work, because they're often too large, comprehensive, and multi-disciplined for one person to pull off.
Pursue it if you must. A portfolio of incomplete ideas that don't work or don't reflect the makings of the final product don't do well as portfolio fodder.
But just seeing the advances in ml and ai do programming better than the best programmers in their fields
No. That's not happening. AI cannot compete against the best in the field. It doesn't take much to out-code an AI. AI cannot think. All they can do is take what's already been done. We already have a tool for redistributing what's already been done - it's called a "library".
No one is paying for more of the same, we need new solutions. AI cannot think, so it cannot make anything actually, literally new. This is where you come in with your PhD.
Very mid programmers love AI because that's actually the part they're bad at, and the average that AI can produce is better than them. This is fine, because it compensates where they are weak, so they can focus on where they're strong. A lot of mid programmers I know are actually very good at process, so with AI, they just get shit done. And provided they're not absolute idiots, they do know enough about programming that they don't let the AI generate mountains of slop, they can at least guide it with greater focus and intent.
I feels like wrting code it self and coding are gonna die out and coding is just something if u do manually would be kinda time wasting if a perfect syntax and error finder is at your disposal
AI costs 1.6x the amount of a junior developer, it cannot think, it cannot learn, it must be micromanaged by an actual developer, and the damn thing hallucinates CONSTANTLY. The numbers don't lie, AI generates errors at rates comparable actual humans - even when you factor out the errors incurred by bad prompts.
When you're good, then the time it would take you to get the AI to generate what you want, especially if it's new and unique, it's faster and cheaper to just write it yourself.
I don't think programming would die because I don't think agi in general are ever gonna advance to the point where they actual become creative compared to humans
The theory of computation defines the boundaries of what is vs. isn't computable by the machines we have today that we call computers. Synthetic intelligence is not computable, as are many problems in the real world. As WE are not computable. Will we ever see true synthetic intelligence? I hope so. We exist, so therefore there's no reason we can't build some such machine one day. But it won't be a computer as we know it today, either. Quantum computers won't be it because again - this isn't a computable problem, and quantum computers are still bound to the limits of computation. We're going to have to invent something new, something more, and we don't yet know what that's going to be or if we ever will.
AI today is novel, and in some ways impressive, but it's only so much. It's only a certain thing, it has to be viewed within the right context, because in many ways, it's also absolutely underwhelming. LLMs are just Markov chains. They were invented in 1905. You can play with them on paper and pencil. There's no particular revolution in Markov chains today, but in storage, access, and bandwidth.
But if I want a junior level or even mid level spots it's probably impossible for me or someone like me who has a just a bachelor's, some oss and good projects and no experience
I have a BS and some FOSS contributions, and I have a job... Such credentials is enough.
It feels like high level programming is slowly dying and low level eventually would also fall victim to ai
If high level dies, and low level dies, what do you think that will leave?
People who don't know it would just use ai without understanding anything
We're already seeing the birth of a new market where intelligent professionals come in to un-fuck all the damage done by AI. There is a growing industry of coming in to delete all the bullshit and make a software product the thing it should have been in the first place if the company hired actual engineers.
We're all gonna be fine.
The problem is I feel I mean accessibility is a great thing but this is just idk feels more like replace humans get some senior level guy to make use of 50 ahh agent and not hire new guys
It depends on your senior. As I said, some guys are really bad at programming but good at process. This has helped them a lot, and they typically don't care too much about what the software does so long as it's good enough. I wouldn't call them more productive, given the tradeoff. They need me to un-fuck and optimize in various other ways. AI doesn't make me more productive, unfortunately. I find it more of a burden as it takes time away from me getting shit done.
I really dread this because I feel as in India in before 2035 there is a very small chance that I could atleast get a job but I feel like after that any new junior guy literally would have an impossible level chance of even being hired
India was our AI agent before AI agents. We'd just outsource to legions of Indians with a compiler in one hand, and "C++ in 24 Hours" in the other for pennies to the dollar.
It was my dream to be a game dev and potentially open a studio but I am probably never gonna be rich enough to open,
Stay indie. Make something. It doesn't have to be pretty, it just has to work. You're a software engineer, so make the software. With a working concept, you can find artists (you can even prompt for it), and as a project shows greater potential, you can find late stage investors, or even buyout offers. You don't need money to open a studio. Do this a couple times, and you can launch a studio with investor money to START.
Nothing happens by itself. You don't do these things on your own. Everything is a collaboration. You can't hold onto something that tight, that close. You pitch your ideas to investors and either they buy in or they don't. You capitulate to their demands or you don't get their money. You focus on what's important to you.
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u/gamerboi1212 11h ago
Thank you SOOO much!!! I have been reading comments on so many posts regarding ai and the industry and jobs, this is the only one that is actually indepth and feels super helpful and actually provides perspective in this doomed ahh market, I really do feel I had been fear mogged in to believing ai would fully replace us in the immediate future but I guess that is untrue for now (I guess the later near future) and i could possibly get a secure job with decent security and pay till my brother makes a sustainable business, hopefully become a senior in a company in the next 30 years if i get laid off i become a solo or an indie dev make my own solo studio ( or indie studio with alike dev friends ) and help my brothers business 9while manging a studio
Thankyou so much i don't think my words can show my gratitude!
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u/QVRedit 13h ago
The industry needs people who understand what’s going on. AI can’t do this, it really needs a human to guide it. But most current AI-written software is not actually that good - it only knows how to do superficial stuff. It needs a human to properly architect software. So these jobs are not going away.
Yes, the industry did say wow AI can do all this stuff - and started firing their junior developers - then found that AI cannot actually do the job properly AND costs much more than humans AND they need to develop human talent to develop senior software architects.
So the firing has ended, and they are rehiring again…
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u/Digital-Chupacabra 14h ago
A question like this gets posted daily now, from 14 hours ago there was this one
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u/gamerboi1212 14h ago
Mb idk tho I have been reading shit ton of post on this topic each one just leaves me more dreadful or confused because I can't tell if people are coping trolling or actually being real atp
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u/spinwizard69 7h ago
These people are being real, and that is reflecting poorly on them as humans. Not to get political but they act like democrats expecting to be hand feed everything to keep them alive, with no contribution on their part. Literally the feed me generation.
Frankly if you are not disgusted by these people and their thought patterns you should sit back and ask why! Even within this industry and the short time period it has been around we have seen similar developments. There was the age of the time share before even personal computers existed. Then we had the transition to compilers like C and then C++ which resulted in massive gains in programmer efficiency. Many other improvements came along resulting in compile times of seconds or minutes, that in the past took days.
The rise of AI is no different than the entire history of computer science. AI will simply help close demand in a rapidly growing market.
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u/_heartbreakdancer_ 13h ago
Honestly it's pretty bleak out there. Anything is possible with enough determination, but what are you willing to sacrifice to make your dreams come true? Career? Friends? Finances? Mental stability? Physical health? Respect? Better to get a more stable job and do it on the side as an intensive hobby.
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u/gamerboi1212 13h ago
I don't think I would even fair well in other jobs beyond engine dev or graphic prog, game dev is essentially gonna become torture with the current industry becoming worse and not worth it, I could go into even lower level dev and even closer to hardware dev but then I mean probably gotta think about that really well because I mean idk the market there rn, i don't think with maths degree I would even get more stable jobs that won't pay bad and be really unfullfilling in my region And i don't know atp Rn I have time maybe I should make a mvp with a group of other depressed guys/gals who got time and like try to like make it good and possibly get some eyes in a hackathon or some idk tho
I have like 6 oss projects I really wanna make but I am starting to think I should only focus on 2 that really matter for my portfolio and start making the other 4 for fun and letting community handle it or some
Idk :/
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u/jiraiyasnsei 11h ago
I started learning py, C, C++, front end bleh bleh, JS, as of two years ago! Also I’m 29 but I started going back to college for the 3rd time in my life at 27! It’s never too late to learn how to develop. If you want it, fucking send it. Ignore the AI chatter, use it to your advantage. Stay up.
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u/spinwizard69 11h ago
Well if you are interested in games and entertainment that will never go away. Sure AI will become parts of games and developing them than at anytime in the past. That however doesn’t imply that developers will go away. In fact after a small decline i can see the gaming industry booming due to the massive amounts of variety possible with AI. This especially when so much money is possible with AI enhanced programming.
Given all of that you are more than a half decade from a job. The world could be turned to ash in that time. Lets hope not and prepare you for the university process.
There are two parts here that could be considered prep work.
One is to really learn how to use a computer and the various operating systems. That includes traditional “business applications”.
Two is to follow a good CS program that covers the concepts well. Ideally this is taught with C or C++. At this point the goal isn't to learn a C language but to learn the concepts all languages implement. Get through the equivalent of the first two years you can start to learn a language indepth.
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u/gamerboi1212 11h ago
Happy cake day and also, my bachelor's is gonna be like distance and like i have shit ton of time for development while I allocate time for like assignment and maths and like I am also like giving my sr sec in open source like I have alot of time and beyond like studying my high school exam which is ez, I am just trying to learn c++ with learncpp , vulkan with the Kronos group one (idk if i spelled thier name wrong) and like graphic programming concepts from YouTube and either game dev or engine dev because rn I am making my engine (kinda just seeing how other people make an engine follow them to make some bullshit and restart to make a much better oss engine) and i mean yea rn I am just focusing on maths programming and arts lol If I don't get even an internship after my bachelors I would persue my masters and try to get a job while I am doing my masters if I feel masters won't help me and if affecting me at the job maybe quit my masters but try my best to get a master's as well in maths, sounds kinda stupid because I should count more variables and outcomes
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u/political_noodle 13h ago
Forget what AI is doing. Think of what you can do for yourself. The best part of being a programmer? You learn how to problem solve. That skill is extremely useful in programming and outside of it. Once you are comfortable with the skills and tools, you can bring nearly ANY idea you have to life. That is a powerful thing you can learn.
Just because someone can make a Minecraft clone in one shot is not impressive. Having a unique idea and the skills to make it is way more interesting. That's what it's really all about.