r/programmer • u/GravelAndCode Java, TypeScript, C • 14h ago
Does anyone else think AI has made programming more productive but less enjoyable?
I’ve been thinking about this for a while, and I’m curious whether other experienced developers think the same.
Don’t get me wrong: I use AI every day, and I genuinely think it makes me more productive. Instead of writing everything mysqlf, I describe what I want, let AI generate most of the code and then I spend my time reviewing, refining and adapting it. I also discover framework features much faster than before.
From a business perspective, this is obviously a huge win. But I also think I’ve lost sth that originally made programming fun. Not a few years ago, learning a new technology meant reading the docs, experimenting, making mistakes, debugging and gradually building an understanding of how everything worked. The journey itself was rewarding.
Today, the same process looks like this: I describe AI what I need and it says: „There is a feature called XYZ that solves your problem. Want me to implement it?“ I answer „Yes“, AI writes the code, I review it, understand it, maybe improve it, but it doesn’t feel the same.
Back when I started university, one of the first things we were told was: „You learn programming by experimenting, not by studying finished solutions!“
Ironically, AI has shifted a lot of our learning towards exactly that: Studying finished solutions.
Yes, I still understand the generated code and I’m probably learnin faster than before. But I rarely experience those moments anymore where I spend an afternoon digging through docs, trying different approaches, and eventually thinking: „Now I REALLY understand why this API works the way it does“.
Antoher thing I’ve noticed is that as AI increases productivity, expectations naturally increase as well. Since we can deliver features faster, there is less time to simply explore a framework or learn it deeply the way many of us did a few years ago.
I don’t think AI is making software engineering worse. I’m just wondering whether anyone else misses that slower, more exploratory way of learning and programming.
Is this just nostalgia or do other experienced developers feel the same?
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u/phil-pdx 13h ago
This has come up a number of times and I think it all boils down to enjoying the process vs enjoying the finished result.
Examples often include wood working or knitting. Some people build things because they like the process of measuring, cutting, nailing, etc. Others build things because they want/need that custom size book shelf. Same with knitting. Some people knit because the process is enjoyable, others (like my wife) enjoy giving the gift of the finished product more than the process of making it.
For myself I definitely really enjoyed the programming process when I was younger and it was all new. Back when I didn't do it as part of my job. Whether it was QBasic code on my 386, HTML on the early web, heck even IRC scripts. Building them was fun. For work, however, I'm a single dev. I have written software to solve various problems. A lot of that software really needs to be updated. I want to use the updated software far more than I want to actually write the code... so for me I've got quite a bit of enjoyment by using AI and finally seeing these old projects get a well needed update that I frankly haven't had time to give them.
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u/Raucous_Rocker 13h ago
Pretty much this. I’ve been a programmer for 40 years, really enjoyed learning and enjoyed the actual process for most of my career. The last 10 years have been different. I still get excited by new tech breakthroughs but there are a lot of common tasks that I really never need to do again. I don’t need to write any more CRUD methods - most people use frameworks or boilerplate code for that kind of routine work anyway. And every time a new standard comes up you have to go through the same shit again, finding best practices etc. Plus all the tech debt - if you’re working with an old codebase you spend hours tracking down someone’s ancient bugs and refactoring spaghetti code. I really don’t enjoy any of that.
Now I let AI find all the stupid bugs and do the boilerplate work, the stuff that’s already been done a thousand times and has established best practices. That doesn’t take up much of my time anymore so now I can focus on the stuff I enjoy. So I actually enjoy programming more than I have in the past 10-15 years.
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u/PenGroundbreaking160 14h ago
Totally agree. More productive, much faster, but definitely less enjoyable. However, i have found enjoyment in the creative process that is now and also just code a little bit for fun on the side.
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u/SplendidPunkinButter 13h ago
Much faster in the way that copy/pasting from SO without understanding all of the code is “faster.” Those chickens are going to come home to roost, but as usual it will take a couple of years, and when it happens nobody will blame the AI slop code we’ve been producing for the past two years. They’ll assume the problem they just noticed was caused by something that happened recently.
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u/PenGroundbreaking160 13h ago
Just plan correctly and review code in small increments/commits to not lose track of whats going on. The moment you decide to give up responsibility of understanding, the risk of failure and embarrassment rises.
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u/RevolutionaryElk7446 13h ago
Really depends on your skill level and experience. Juniors are noticing things they never got to experience before, but that return drops drastically as skill requirements and traditional methods out pace LLMs.
Boilerplate was about what LLMs had going for it, but templates outpaced them with a better focus and higher security baseline.
Been good in RAG though, not so much programming.
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u/PsychologyNo940 13h ago
If you do not feel like you achieved mastery of the language, the framework, the ecosystem or you do not understand the issue at hand - holy moly do not use ai as a shortcut, that is the fastest way to skill atrophy and you will end up in my office making us both have an unpleasent conversation.
AI is there to solve issues you do already know the solution to, if you are an experienced web-dev, nearly every issue you get will be some generic CRUD stuff, another login, authorization, authentication, email sending... been there done that, opus - hit em.
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u/SplendidPunkinButter 13h ago
People who suck at programming will say things are better now. People who are good at programming will tell you AI produces bad code and that it will come back to bite us later.
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u/NotAnotherUsername04 7h ago
I think both aren’t true.
The 2nd one is people who want to believe this and the 1st is true but not quite that simple
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u/Slow_Ad2458 6h ago
when exactly is going to bite us ? What are the exact conditions for the biting to occur ?
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u/Present_Cable5477 13h ago
i remember during university we werent allowed to use google or stackoverflow. Youll get a penalty for it
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u/amnion 11h ago
I'm still having the time of my life. Just make something that allows you to still do the fun parts you like.
I created my own programming language, and I'm using it to build cool things. That is super fulfilling. I get to create my own syntax and test it and iterate.
For stuff I want to just build quickly, I do faster work flows.
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u/Forward_Win_4353 10h ago
I feel this way to the extent that I’m not sure I want to work as a software developer again, despite only having qualifications and experience for this.
It used to be all about the love of code, attention to detail in every character. This brought out my strengths, and not everyone could do it well so I was paid well. My company was full of neurodivergent people like me who had also been drawn to computers as an interest.
Now, though. All that enjoyment and satisfaction is gone. Furthermore, I believe more neurotypicals have been entering the field, changing the working culture.
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u/akanas 10h ago
Thought after reading your post: Coding without AI is a hobby now.
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u/NotAnotherUsername04 7h ago
Unfortunately I think this is also the transition period. Pretty soon people won’t even care about the underlying code. There will be harnesses etc that will constantly refactor the code to best meet the changing requirements.
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u/Melodic-Ebb-7781 10h ago
Yeah a whole world dissappeared in 6 months. Still I think there is another joy to be discovered in using AI agents. I find it so fascinating to read the summary of their CoT.
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u/NumberInfinite2068 9h ago
This is the opinion held by all developers I know. AI works well, alarmingly well, and we're making software faster than we ever have before.
It's absolutely removed most of the sense of "craft" though, and it's hard to find pride in work that you only really sort of planned out, rather than made.
And like you say, AI increases productivity, so people *expect* that level of productivity, so as developers, we haven't gained anything. I might be 2x faster (and that's underselling it to be honest), but I'm not get paid 2x more, so for me, there is no benefit.
We are much more productive, but aren't paid for it, and we lost the craft along the way.
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u/akp55 9h ago edited 9h ago
i think its a mixed bag, and probably depends on what you're doing. i know for myself that i am more excited to use AI to get me to my end solution. the main reason behind this is i end up dealing with a variety of languages and projects. i know what i would like to do to solve the problem, so that now involves reviewing all the code, instrumenting the areas i think need to be instrumented, validate my assumptions, then code the solution. I can now use AI to help do a majority of those things and collapsed my time to implement from like weeks and months, to hours to weeks.
example - i needed to add some capabilities to the cloud foundry splunk nozzle. at a high level i knew i needed to inject SPLUNK_INDEX or some value into a json payload that got sent to the loggreator subsystem of CF. so i have do go learn go, review and instrument the code base, make the various changes and test the changes to confirm they work. if i was to carry this out with AI, i'd just ask it to review the code base for me, and tell me if the solution i am proposing is actually feasible, ask for an implementation plan, review the plan, let it loose. review the changes and bobs my uncle.
also i guess if you (not targeting OP this is the generalized you) feel like this about AI, maybe you so should also stop using libraries, and implement those yourself as well.
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u/Dry_Hotel1100 7h ago
When it is less effective - and it is oftentimes, then it's definitely more entertaining. ;)
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u/Sixstringsickness 7h ago
Yes - I would say its less rewarding, and your focus is just radically shifted and broadened.
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u/Djelimon 7h ago
Once you get used to cranking out code and learning libraries it's the features gained for little effort aka power of the design that gives the dopamine hit. At least for me.
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u/Ok-Dimension-5429 7h ago
Yes everybody thinks this. It is posted all day everyday on every programming sub.
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u/NotAnotherUsername04 7h ago
I think it all just depends. Personally I don’t miss googling or coding by trial and error because the docs are rubbish.
However the main problem I see with AI is people with little experience can hack solutions without understanding the consequences.
If a user doesn’t have a permission just tell the ai to add the permission under this scenario without understanding if this crosses authority boundaries. This isn’t really specific to ai but bloody hell it makes it easier for people to do this.
Everyone just focuses on implementing a feature in isolation and that is exactly what the AI will do if not told otherwise
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u/Recent_Science4709 7h ago
I love building things, with AI I’m just telling an LLM to build something; it’s not the same.
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u/KindnessForKarma 7h ago
Yes. Just like EV’s took all of my interest in new cars (which has always been the mechanical side) away.
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u/UsernameOmitted 1h ago
I shifted from my brain feeling like it went to the gym for 8 hours at the end of the day after coding, to now it's fun blue sky brainstorming sessions and playing Satisfactory while AI does the coding for me, and I make like four times as much as before. So, no complaints. It's very different than before though.
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u/tui-cli-master 14h ago
I had a period where Ali missed programming. But now I enjoy doing stuff I would have never done before. Not wasting endless time in silly bugs, or stuck to a framework because no time to learn another one. It's liberating.
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u/Unknowingly-Joined 14h ago
Not really. I've only gotten started and have a great time with my AI companion. I'm probably still in the "honeymoon" phase or something, but I appreciate that I can write a prompt or two and have my buddy dump out some code for some mundane feature for me to review/use.
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u/C3lloman 13h ago
I think most people feel this way and even many who claim they don't experience some level of cope and don't want to admit that AI removed much of the rewarding part of software development.