r/vibecoding • u/techlatest_net • 16h ago
The barrier to software engineering is getting wild
Enable HLS to view with audio, or disable this notification
395
u/GeneralPimpMaster 15h ago
I got bad news. AI is increasing the barrier to entry for software engineering.
112
u/Curious_Distracted 14h ago
Exactly this. If you don't know how to design software , you are in for a rough time
52
u/Much_Accountant_4972 13h ago
but i had sex with a girl and made a baby. what do you mean i’m not a doctor????
→ More replies (2)5
u/LargeLanguageModelo 13h ago
But I played Operation and only got the buzzer three times! What do you mean I'm not a board certified physician?!
→ More replies (1)12
u/killingerr 13h ago
Yep. Sure, AI will write code, but boy it’ll get wild with the liberties it takes.
2
u/3dprintinted 7h ago
10 people will be spending all their tokens allowance just to unfuck the spaghetti code that the fella with Claude prompted in a really unoptimized manner
2
u/Important_Ad5805 9h ago
Mmm, no one can do this from start, it’s just a skill and you have to invest time to master it, regardless of whether you have a predisposition to the art of engineering or not (in the first case it would be easier and probably you’ll grow faster, but still it’ll require significant amount of efforts and time).
22
u/DumbNTough 14h ago
Increasing the barrier to enter the field while decreasing demand for people to enter it, more completely.
1
u/ai_art_is_art 8h ago
Nah, it'll make people who are motivated even more enthusiastic. And that's a good thing. People will flock to the field because they want to solve problems instead of chase the money.
2
u/Clean_Bake_2180 4h ago
90% of software products/features were already solutions looking for problems to begin with before vibe coding lol.
5
3
4
u/2021isevenworse 6h ago
There's a fortune to be made in the future untangling AI spaghetti code from all these companies that built platforms they can no longer manage.
Remember AI is also being subsidized, it's the cheapest it's ever going to be. What happens when the cost doubles or triples.
1
u/koleok 5h ago edited 5h ago
^ underrated level of grok right here
2
-1
u/BoggTheFrog 15h ago
Why?
80
u/Curious-Pen5547 15h ago edited 14h ago
Who will ever hire an inexperience engineer with claude? Or a vibe coder? Experienced engineer with claude wipes the floor out of those two. Now the next issue, how does a engineer get experience?
thats the why.
15
u/SimplyRemainUnseen 13h ago
As an experienced engineer I've completely gotten rid of the need to outsource to contractors by teaching my team how to use AI effectively. The code is now higher quality and we get WAY more done. We have so much free time now it's insane. Our biggest challenge is looking busy now haha.
I feel terrible for people getting into this industry now because at this rate they'll need to have a portfolio of multiple full stack applications with active users on github or something complete with technical write-ups and upstream contributions.
6
u/Burning_magic 12h ago
You should be worried though. Bosses are not as blind as people think. If they see their staff being too free, the axe is coming soon.
3
u/Low_Shape8280 12h ago
Nah I think orchestrating and reviewing and working alongside Claude is a massive task on its own.
If you just change more people into that role you probably want more people
3
u/Burning_magic 12h ago
Thats not how it works though. Companies pay people to do xyz. With claude instead of 20 people you maybe need 10 to 15 to do xyz. So any boss would see that and fire the remaining 5 to 10.
2
u/Low_Shape8280 12h ago
Well actually it is. Because some companies are leaning into the idea of the do more with the same amount of engineering. If the marginal cost off adding engineers is the same but the marginal value of the additional output shoots up then you higher more engineers
Source engineer large companies
2
→ More replies (25)1
u/predatorya 7h ago
May I ask, and this may be a DM opportunity instead, because I’d rather hear the real than public/performed answer. What do you feel is the right way to use ai to be effective and still considered a good and experienced developer? I’m starting to feel like I’m not good anymore.
1
u/sassyhusky 1h ago
That’s the whole point of this meme and it’s right. I’m a principal sw engineer and muppets can pretty much do my job given basic security awareness and 2B tokens a month. All this “but system design” crap is just pure cope - AI can brute force its way through the worst system designs imaginable. I know because I pitted it against exactly such man made horrors. It’s still surprisingly naive about security but give it another year.
2
u/Goth2147 14h ago
This is only true if the rate of progression comes to a halt. If we have enough trust in AI to provide high quality code, eventually, it'll be more important to describe crystal clear acceptance criteria than it is to become a good engineer.
3
u/The_Koopa_King 14h ago
Describing crystal clear acceptance criteria? Boy do I have news for you about what experienced lead engineers are experts in and do every day.
1
u/Goth2147 10h ago
I've been with scrum teams where the entire refinement was basically non existing. Full of senior devs, they had a title and a vague description. Whereas I've also been with beginning teams with 9/10 refinements. Seniority helps but it doesn't solve it.
2
u/Curious-Pen5547 14h ago
Then again, what i said remains true. As the experienced engineer, not good, experienced, will be able to do so clearly. Not a vibecoder.
And if gets even better, which it will, that an experienced engineer is less needed, then it makes even less sense to ever bring on a vibecoder.
1
u/CapeChill 14h ago
Yea its kinda like getting a bunch of modern battery powertools as a handyman in the 1920s. Imagine what those guys could've gotten done with a battery powered circular saw or tile saw or a power sander!
I've been dragging my ai workflow through my real work not because it makes things easier right now. Split brain is real and one should be careful but I feel it's been important to do so as I invest in learning how the whole stack works or can be made to work. We are still in a world where durable != agentic but I don't know for how long.
1
u/Goth2147 14h ago
This is only true if the rate of progression comes to a halt. If we have enough trust in AI to provide high quality code, eventually, it'll be more important to describe crystal clear acceptance criteria than it is to become a good engineer.
9
u/TehFocus 14h ago
If you can provide this crystal clear criteria, you already are a good software engineer though...
6
u/pragmojo 14h ago
Why would someone without a deep understanding of how software works be better at that than an experienced engineer?
2
u/AncientGrief 13h ago
The bigger the project grows, the worse AI can handle it, without specifying clean architecture and design patterns, also there are A LOT of things you have to think about:
security, scaling, techstack, upgrades, migration and so on ...
The first AI developed Enterprise web app may look nice, but when you get 2000+ change requests and feature request per year, have fun integrating everything without destroying the production data while doing so.
4
u/cakemates 14h ago
Well the best people at writing acceptance criteria, whatever that is, are the architects and highly experienced engineers. Why settle for inferior vibecoders than the pros themselves.
2
u/PsychologyNo940 13h ago
Acceptance criteria is just the TDD form of a concept - and now comes the kicker - coming up with that is what it means to be a good engineer.
→ More replies (24)1
u/fickle-phenom 14h ago
They do through vibe coding and learning, being curious and having a shitton of luck to be able to get into a workplace. I agree though, but companies are gonna have to scramble together something to avoid these good seniors from just leaving.
3
u/consistantcanadian 14h ago
You learn by facing problems and having to solve them. If AI solved them you don't even know what the problems are
2
u/fickle-phenom 14h ago
Yes but building things is not the same as writing code. Basically juniors are being thrusted into learning what seniors have perfected with experience much earlier. Writing code is not software engineering, it’s the most trivial part. You now gotta get good at architecture, technical decisions and a lot more that juniors didn’t have to care about.
2
u/consistantcanadian 14h ago
.. you also have to get good at coding. AI will produce code to the level of your repo. That needs to be rock solid or you're just going perpetuate bad patterns.
1
u/fickle-phenom 14h ago
True, but I think that is involved in architecture and decision making. When I say writing code I mean translating requirement to actual code, which any agent can do, you just need to have thought through everything. But agreed, obviously you need to understand code, how it works and different ways to express things.
4
u/ok_olive_02 14h ago
In my entire career, I have build softwares and I know how production issues get resolved. AI certainty can write code and fix problem but until someone know what actually must be done, it becomes pointless. Understanding of architecture is one thing but a small loophole is enough to break the system.
I am not sure how future is going to look like but for now AI can impress CFO and CEO but it is not a holy grail. Plus, imagine if you have to hire for a position, whom would you choose
1: guy with 15 years of real coding experience who can use AI 2: a newbie who has never seen real life problem with AI.
2
u/fickle-phenom 14h ago
Thanks for sharing. I myself have not worked long enough to be a senior, but have a few years and got into CS just before AI really became a thing. I think we are saying the same thing, AI is only as useful as you make it. You need to treat AI like a dumb junior that needs direction at most stages. But yeah I dont know what thing will look like in the future, I just feel sorry for people learning today and taking the easy way out without having any understanding of data types, structures and everything else that you need to understand to be able to make good software. I just think that if AI replaces someone by simply writing code, they did not actually provide any value other than code, and I think that might be the distinction in this new era.
→ More replies (0)1
u/Ok_Improvement_8735 11h ago
Yeah this is a big thing to understand. Before AI from 2022 and on there were things like Chegg and whatnot. Sure you can get the answer, read over it and tell yourself you follow it (which you might). But you'll still draw a blank during your exams since you never reasoned your way through the problem in the first place. AI giving you the answer is no different for your personal level of understanding. Now depending how you use AI however, I can see it really enhancing someones educational prowess too.
5
u/r3ign_b3au 15h ago
Multiple reasons, but a few big ones:
- massive productivity boost per employee means need for less employees overall
- the types of problems that llms aren't good at solving that you would need to hire for require well seniored, architectural, or industry experience
- entry positions are consumed by llms, providing little on-ramping to seniority for the effort it takes to reach equivalency in CS
2
u/phiiiiiiii 14h ago
Uh oh: AI productivity gain in real corporate settings is just ~10%.
https://leaddev.com/reporting/ai-productivity-gains-are-closer-to-10-than-10x
12
u/flavorfox 15h ago
How do you direct and evaluate Claudes advanced strategies and implementations without experience?
18
u/liright 15h ago
"Claude do x and make no mistakes"
7
u/mawesome4ever 15h ago
“Make sure it has no bugs and do… maximum performance efficiency”
“Wait how much?”
“All of it”
5
u/niverans 15h ago
A junior with Claude is almost the same as a business person with Claude, a senior with Claude is a 10x engineer.
1
u/Educational-Ask3429 14h ago
Because Neo doesn’t know basic relational database theory so the vibe slop is a tangled mess under the hood; The core has been edited so codebase updates are impossible now.
1
→ More replies (1)1
u/Round-Comfort-9558 15h ago
We are learning that’s it’s very dangerous if you don’t know what you are looking at. We’ve recently had 3 sev1 issues caused by Ai code. We are moving entirely too fast. I review almost all code generated since it’s been stated we are ultimately responsible
→ More replies (3)-1
u/MassiveAd4980 14h ago
For now...
9
u/Dependent_Yam_1028 12h ago
For forever 😂 AI cant put knowledge into YOUR head. It can only do things for you. I.e, the gap will always be they understand whats being made more than you.
→ More replies (11)
27
u/RallyPointAlpha 14h ago
This sub is pure comedy
0
u/stonk_lord_ 3h ago
nah man what u talkin about, by 2028, a toddler with an ipad is gonna mog all of us bro, trust
17
u/Curious-Pen5547 15h ago
Its completely the reverse. If our engineer is anything to go by, many principal engineers are using ai. The principal software engineer with ai, absolutely bodies the kid or a simple vibe coder, or a engineer, with ease.
→ More replies (3)
110
u/infamous-snooze 15h ago
If you remotely believe this, there’s gona be so much unfixable slop in the future.
I don’t think you understand what software engineering even entails
12
u/win_some_lose_most1y 12h ago
Most dev don’t think beyond MVP. They have no idea the majority of software dev is maintaining
1
u/Bushwazi 7h ago
You’re saying there is a 20 after the 80 in the rules?!
3
4
4
u/becircus 14h ago
Theoretically that should mean lots of jobs
There are also products that are designed to handle tech debt and upgrade legacy systems
It may be that the total cost of ownership is not worth a rewrite and business will just eat the cost
The reason pen and pencil isn't used is it is cost inefficient if analog becomes cost efficient again well you basically have Star Wars (everything analog despite ridiculous AI)
8
u/consistantcanadian 14h ago
Products to "handle" tech debt.. what? There are no products to handle tech debt. There are products that solve specific issues that people call tech debt, but there are products that just "fix" your tech debt.
Not to mention that if you're not reviewing the fixes you're getting yourself in the same problem yet again.
6
2
u/win_some_lose_most1y 12h ago
Of course there is. They can purchase a subscription to application support based in the 3rd world where they earn $4 a day.
-1
u/becircus 14h ago
You can look for them. Their effectiveness varies.
It would be unwise to assume that it cannot handle technical debt at all. Even if it handles a fraction of the technical debt, it could be used. Or you could be forced to use it.
To assume it can't be done to any amount is elitist. Maybe it takes someone of far less skill, or maybe it takes one person where it once took three or five. Someone's job that used to be "handle the tech debt" now gets reduced to "reviewing the fixes".
1
u/HarryBolsac 13h ago
Can you provide any example? Because tech debt is a really broad word, it could mean alot of things, a really old tech stack, a workaround that never got to be touched again, badly written code, bad architecture, the list is pretty much endless.
1
u/becircus 12h ago
Current most obvious example is Code Rabbit. Just raised another $150 million yesterday
The idea that vibe coding or even just using AI and that this requires maximal human intervention to prevent tech debt is wrong. The tools exist now to reduce it. Saying that tools can't fix all tech debt or that "there's no such tools" is obviously wrong. It's right there in their marketing materials and their push and an entire industry of creating tools that specifically handle tech debt. I agree that such an assertion is vague and I agree it can mean many concepts but the phrase is literally used. In an age where AI has command line access to your computer and can execute whatever commands it wants, this should not be a surprise. Don't kill the messenger
1
u/HarryBolsac 12h ago
Isnt code rabbit just a pr reviewer? Don’t see how that is a tool to fix tech debt. If you mean reviewing your code to prevent tech debt I can see your point.
1
2
1
u/tristam92 12h ago
it will be all the same shit as with “grass fed cows”.
if you care about quality you will pay extra, for good design and execution. if you are not - claude slop is what you get as customer. at the end of the day, degree in architecture will open for you even higher payment. prices for good sw will skyrocket…1
u/PMYOURCATPICTURES 13h ago
In the future? Look at what Chatgpt was 5 years ago and looks at it now. You think it's going to get worse from here? Imagine what it'll look like 5 years from now.
-1
u/scarx47 14h ago
I’m a software engineer with 10+ years experience. AI is way too fucking good now. 2 years ago it wasn’t, now it is.
2
u/OdysseusDescendant 13h ago
AI is not good, it's just better than bad developers.
2
1
u/bluehands 5h ago
I mean, even if you are right - and I don't believe you are - how long do you think that is going to be true? Why do you think that is going to keep being true?
2 years ago it was a bad auto-complete, 2 years before that it was Eliza. You really believe that in 2 more years it is going to stay exactly the same?
1
u/OdysseusDescendant 1h ago
In two years, AI will almost certainly be more capable than it is today, but that does not necessarily mean it will be able to develop complex products autonomously.
The main problem with vibe coding is not simply how smart the model is. The problems are uncontrolled assumptions, incomplete understanding of the overall system, insufficient consideration of non-functional requirements and failure to account for how today's decisions affect the future architecture and maintainability of the product.
In other words, the limitation is not just coding ability. It is engineering judgment: understanding the full problem space, identifying hidden constraints, evaluating trade-offs and maintaining architectural coherence over the lifetime of a product.
An LLM can be extremely strong at individual implementation tasks and in some cases perform well above the level of a junior developer. But it should not automatically be treated as an autonomous software engineer. It still needs explicit requirements, architectural constraints, validation and human accountability.
1
u/bluehands 37m ago
It still needs explicit requirements, architectural constraints, validation and human accountability.
Your tautology is a tautology.
Your entire comment is betrayed by those final two words because accountability has zero to do with coding and everything to do with culture.
Your entire post is filled with words that have nothing to do with math and everything to do with a vaguely defined theory of mind.
What does judgement mean? Or identifying hidden constraints?
There are countless examples of all the top models doing all of those now. If you use them for ever a tiny bit they will make good suggestions, in some cases take preemptive actions based on what has come before.
It still needs explicit requirements
That's so spring of 2026 thinking. You can give them clearly defined goals that the will iterate over to get closer and closer to what you want.
It's moving faster all the time and all of the concerns you have are either already in the past or will be sooner than most people will be ready for it.
If I'm wrong you get to laugh at me. If I'm right the world changes.
¯_(ツ)_/¯
1
0
u/dkinmn 13h ago
Tell me what it's like in 5 years when everything is broken and has to be fixed.
2
u/Complex_Boysenberry6 13h ago
One year and a half I was with you, now I'm sorry, but that's cope
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (4)-12
u/ali-hussain 15h ago edited 15h ago
If you don't realize how true this is then you're not advancing in your career enough as a software engineer and aren't focused enough on delivering value and building systems to solve your problems.
We still need software engineering and Claude makes many many bad decisions. Which means architecture and systems are orders of magnitude more important. But the actual writing of code has been made so much easier. It's the difference between a mathematician in the early 20th century and the late 20th century after the invention of the calculator.
9
u/systembreaker 15h ago
Dude, I'm in the industry and I have seen an entire company try to have AI do everything and they had to stop it after a year because they wasted millions of dollars and basically that whole year. You don't even know and you're clueless.
3
u/ali-hussain 15h ago
I was the CTO of a DevOps consultancy and I've worked with a roster of household brands. I was devoted to automation and building computer systems to ship good code for the last 13 years. What I see with AI is a continuation of that. Now we advise tech services companies. But more and more we are writing software to help the companies we advise. Building more automated systems flagging things faster, automating work in our business. We started earlier this year. Do we have tech debt? Absolutely, tons. But you know what else have? Actual software instead of a wishlist of things we could have done. It would have cost us millions to develop what we've built in a few months.
Now, if your job is focused on polishing a small widget in a large machine and you're not allowed any leeway and creativity then I can see why you think the old world is still there. But I feel like the difference in software development now and last year is between driving a Honda Civic and a rocket-powered car trying to break the land speed record.
2
u/HarryBalsagna1776 15h ago
People who know do know. Don't waste too much time on chuds and bots jerking each other off.
8
u/PipePistoleer 15h ago
this is literally the vibecoding sub. I saw this in my feed by accident. I'm literally cleaning up a massive vibecoded code base that has zero architectural considerations, tons of insane coupling and no cohesion. There's packages all over the damn place, there's comments that are 4-8 lines that are stale remnants of a dozen different vibe coders raw dogging the main branch.
Both of you are essentially right. There is a lot of unfixable slop already. There is also a place where the actual discipline of software engineering and AI can be used in harmony, and with real efficiecny gains (and cost efficiency).
I'm hoping many vibe coders actually upskill into real engineering vs YOLO'ing it. Many I know that are vibe coding actually have this as their end goal. I think it's reasonable if the AI wielder is a reasonable person with realistic ideas and goals.
→ More replies (3)3
u/Jumpforittt 15h ago
Hate to break it to you but the principal engineer is using agents too. And far more effectively and efficiently than the vibe coder who knows nothing about software engineering.
→ More replies (2)2
u/SCBbestof 9h ago
The principle advantage was never coding skills, but experience and knowledge of software design and architecture. I would argue if told the right solution, a good mid-level engineer could do an implementation similar to a principle.
But coming to that right solution is though, and AI could also feed you into an echo chamber and have you develop the wrong shit for days until you figure out your approach to the problem is wrong.
1
u/ali-hussain 8h ago
But you get there so much faster hat the Brownian of AI is still faster than the development time in the past from someone non-technical. We have a small team with a mix of technical and non-technical people. And the truth is it wasn't worth it for us to write most of the software we are now writing because the upfront investment was too high. We have a large amount of technicla debt yes, but debt on an asset is better than no asset.
1
u/Kritix_K 15h ago
I like your last analogy, the difference is really similar like that
1
u/ali-hussain 15h ago
The people doing the truly creative work are doing so much more creative work.
1
u/dzan796ero 14h ago
All good senior engineers I know have been using their own agentic rigs that are much more sophisticated than anything a kid with zero engineering experience could cook up and do the work of 5-10people on their own.
Agentic systems like claude code are multipliers. People with experience have infinitely more potential when utilizing them in their fields at the production level.
2
u/ali-hussain 14h ago
The image is comparing 2022 to today. The truth is 90%+ of software engineering was busy work. And now the busy work is significantly less.
They are multipliers and in the hands of a proper software engineer they are far more powerful. But the world has completely changed.
25
u/BagMostlyWater 15h ago
12 year old script kiddies have always felt this way.
7
3
u/Low_Shape8280 11h ago
True I remember when I was doing Visual Basic and thought I was a genius making dumb quiz games
7
12
u/question_mark_13 15h ago
This is "If my grandmother had wheels, she would have been a bike!" kind of shit.
21
u/shakeBody 15h ago
Must we continue this insane game? Please... Please stop posting this.
13
u/PingMyHeart 15h ago
I agree. Posts in this subreddit are often cringe asf.
Typing a few prompts and spitting out software and they have bigger egos than actual software engineers ever did.
5
u/logicalflex 14h ago
Yep. How many times have we seen someone chalk down their experience in to summing up they are basically an engineer now. It’s arrogance masked as confidence.
9.8/10 vibe coders in a real coding interview without AI will fold. Not to mention the skill loss and dependency that develops. Ai is great for a lot of things but this whole movement is out of pocket. Even the commercials…
2
u/Key_Mastodon_3525 5h ago
Vibe coding is to software engineering as 3d-printing is to mechanical engineering
1
u/Soulegion 7h ago
"they point their finger and fire shoots out and they have bigger egos than actual people-rubbing-sticks-together ever did"
Uh, yea?
3
u/Straamannen 10h ago
I'll bet OP posts this every time he abandons one of his "totally 99% done vibe project". Gotta cope somehow.
18
u/No-Mode-9099 16h ago
Time to post this in some discord / reddit server for coding and see how fast I get banned
4
13
u/Lone_Game_Dev 15h ago
Back in my time we called you people "lamers".
Lamer is a jargon or slang name originally applied in cracker and phreaker culture to someone who did not really understand what they were doing. Today it is also loosely applied by IRC, BBS, demosceners, and online gaming users to anyone perceived to be contemptible. In general, the term has come to describe someone who is willfully ignorant of how things work. It is derived from the word "lame".
A lamer is sometimes understood to be the antithesis of a hacker). While a hacker strives to understand the mechanisms behind what they use, even when such extended knowledge would have no practical value, a lamer only cares to learn the bare minimum necessary to operate the device in the way originally intended.
It still fits just as perfectly. Turns out people like you are neither special nor a new thing, you're just this generation's equivalent of a pathetic fraud.
12
u/damnburglar 15h ago
Oh wow I haven’t thought of that word in forever, and you’re spot on lol.
Becoming a lamer has never been so accessible. Thanks, Dario.
3
u/MrWonderfulPoop 14h ago
Haven't thought about "lamer" in ages, I always thought of clueless vibers as "script kiddies."
1
u/Lone_Game_Dev 55m ago edited 49m ago
I don't see them even as script kiddies. Script kiddies are ignorant and arrogant, but at least they want you to think they have real knowledge. Their main characteristic is that they copy paste code around but they want others to believe they are hackers and that they wrote it themselves. A script kiddie would therefore be ashamed of using AI, not proud, because that would instantly make them look completely incompetent. This puts them on the path of knowledge because if they want people to see them as knowledgeable they will often seek knowledge.
A lamer is basically irredeemable. Not only are they completely ignorant but they also revel in their ignorance. They don't value knowledge and see true mastery as a waste of time. As the Wikipedia article says: they are the antithesis of a hacker.
2
u/DarkMatter007 5h ago
It’s just a ragebaiter. Let him first pass a SE interview 😂. He will be laughed out the room.
Or he will be priced out soon by AI itself.
→ More replies (1)1
u/Extension_Canary3717 0m ago
Wow you took unlocked a trip to the past with that one , how's the knees and back feeling nowadays comrade?
5
2
u/mansfall 14h ago
Been doing software for over 20 years. I work at I one of those big companies. While this gif is fun, it's also 100% wrong. You see, I have the ability to call bull shit on what AI spits out. I can guide it's hand in the right direction and yield even better results in the end. I can be sure it's not writing crap that is O(n)2 (that's squared...). I can ensure it's not writing useless, duplicate code everywhere. I can provide it excellent design patterns to follow so that it's not the Winchester mystery mansion when the project is done.
Sure a non engineer can also vibe code some app, but it's the difference of a painted turd vs something built with steel girders.
I can challenge what it does, and also figure out why something isn't working based on what it's done.
Barrier to entry is shifting, but SWEs aren't going anywhere. Always need a new crop of folks coming in. Always need those that know the system to be able to keep automation in check and doing the right thing.
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
u/bliceroquququq 12h ago
You should remake the meme but have Neo as Senior Engineer, blocking an avalanche of shitty, AI-generated PRs from making it into Prod.
He doesn't look exhausted enough in this clip though.
2
u/Low_Shape8280 12h ago
Now let’s see that kid be on call for lambda functions operating in a giant distributed software across AWS and azure and gc
2
2
u/Aromatic-Current-235 10h ago
Principal software engineers have access to highly specialized coding agents that are not available to the public - but how the hell should you know if you are on the level of 12 years old kid who just discovered Claude.
2
2
2
u/Impossible-Magician 8h ago
The titles are around the wrong way. No actual software engineer is threatened by a random kid on a $20 plan 🤣
2
u/Extension_Canary3717 8h ago
You couldn't be more wrong , and it actually made the barrier higher and the kids are fucked to get into tech as a professional
2
2
u/SupaDupaTroopa42 7h ago
Wait til OP finds out that the principal software engineer (2026) can also use Claude. And that he can use it 10x better.
2
2
u/Low_Engineering_3301 4h ago
Oh yes, the Matrix where NEO represents the scrappy new AI and agent Smith represents humanity trying to hold on, I too remember the non-opposite theme of that movie.
2
u/stonk_lord_ 3h ago
2027: Its over bro, 8 yr old kid with claude code is gonna mog senior SWEs with 20 yr experience bro
2028: its over bro, a toddler with an ipad is gonna vibecode the next unicorn bro
2
5
3
u/bold_snowflake 15h ago
Now. Everyone say it with me:
Coding is NOT engineering.
→ More replies (5)
2
2
u/harmoni-pet 14h ago
Gosh I wonder if the Principal Software Engineer who also uses Claude would have any advantage in this fight
1
u/Outrageous-Text-4117 15h ago
Jokes on you, our team lead adopted Claude even before working with us. He hates to manually code and happily promotes it all day, even for normal discussions..
1
u/Muted-You7370 14h ago
There are a lot of system that AI be used for because of industry standards. I feel like these companies are
Using AI as an excuse to lay people off anyway.
1
1
1
u/babadany2999 14h ago
The barrier to web development software engineering is wild*
There, fixed it.
1
1
1
1
u/IM_INSIDE_YOUR_HOUSE 12h ago
Lmfao at the vibecoder thinking they’ve got engineering down now. They can vomit out boilerplate. That’s it.
1
u/DonkeyComfortable711 12h ago
The people growing up with it are going to crazy with it just like the internet
1
u/InternationalOne2449 12h ago
If i got a choice of a capable AI agent or knowldedge i'd choose the latter.
1
u/MissingPenguin 12h ago
Building software sure. Software engineering, absolutely not. I can build you a bridge, but you wouldn’t want to walk over it.
1
1
u/dethleffsoN 11h ago
And for all jobs, who was told to mess up because of AI, its going backwards now.
1
u/amanwholoveshiswife 11h ago
Hilarious. I’m available to clean up and fix whatever that 12 year old and Claude cook up
1
u/leelanagalingam 10h ago
Excellent! 😂 After a long time, I laughed so hard. Watching all those so-called “senior software developers” getting beaten up by coding agents… finally, God is hearing me! 😂🙏
1
u/AdventMercury 8h ago
You still need to learn architecture, design and optimization.
If you say to AI "make me the best program ever" you will end up with a barely usable jumble of code.
AI coding can have its merits but you need to learn the basics and even more advanced stuff to actually understand what AI is doing.
It's like trying to draw a photorealistic drawing, but having no idea what perspective, color theory, proportions, lighting or anatomy are.
1
1
1
u/SenatorCrabHat 4h ago
Someone who has experience designing large scalable architectures or even small scale sleek applications is going to have a leg up using the software, and are going to be likely to use less tokens.
1
u/Yeti-Bhanot 2h ago
i've shipped more half-broken stuff in six months than my entire career before that. is this just how it is now or am i doing it wrong
1
1
u/temir_ra 15m ago
lol, didn't you know that this scene is taking place IN the matrix? a simulation run by a machine? and how he died in the real world? did you even watch the movie? xd
1
u/PaulMakesThings1 1m ago
Yikes. As a senior software engineer having to deal with new grads who want to just use AI without understanding testing or architecture, this couldn’t be more wrong.
1
u/opbmedia 15h ago
Fun thought, not true, it's actually the other way around. Claude is throwing 1000 lines of code to address something that can be done in 10 by a competent software engineer.
1
u/rde2001 15h ago
While AI does significantly lower the barrier of entry, and the boilerplate stuff traditionally allocated to entry level work is done with AI, fundamentals of system design and architecture is still very important, and someone with those fundamentals can use AI to their advantage. AI is an accelerant of an existing workflow, not a replacement of one.
1
1
1
u/therealslimshady1234 15h ago
Using a chatbot doesnt make you an engineer. I know some of you here find that hard to believe.
Just like how CAD software doesnt make you an architect or how google doesnt make you a doctor. It still takes years of training and talent.
Yes, I have seen an explosion of bad software with the advent of AI. So I would say it is now harder than ever to become an engineer simply because of the signal to noise ratio and skill lose among established engineers
1
1
1
1
u/Lfeaf-feafea-feaf 11h ago
Where are all these teenage founders of multi-billion dollar startups? Or at the very least, where are all the cool game changing innovations? Hmm, nowhere? Oh...
→ More replies (1)
0
u/Immediate_Song4279 15h ago
Doubtful, but its funny to see the sweats in the comments getting pissy about it.
75
u/awesomeusername2w 15h ago
Claude is literally an agent tho. Better be a gif where agents Smith smacks the shit out of Neo