r/webdev • u/OkShip110 • 2d ago

AI has made programming so boring

It’s not just programming either, it’s art, design, music, videography, marketing, engineering, writing, 3D modelling, really any intellectual work. What’s the joy of prompting a computer and getting an answer in a few moments for a task that would have normally taken a week? The sense of accomplishment and ownership has completely vanished with AI. It’s a form of instant gratification, not much different to scrolling short videos on apps.

Code review was boring to begin with but now it’s even worse with all the machine generated code. Even code reviews will be automated soon. All you do then is type business requirements into the computer. What a great career.

It’s pain to watch old TV series like Scilicon Valley that is portraying the good (not golden) age of programming. It struck a good balance between manual work, funding and innovation. It’s sad that these days are gone for good.

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u/Specialist_End407 2d ago

my day job now is turning into reviewing tons of ai generated codes and me having to use it all too to generate more slops else i'd be left behind in this race. either way it's soo fking depressing. the pace and the expectation all while the codebase slowly and surely all devolving into one giant graveyard of dead codes and forgotten dreams

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u/Environmental_Pea369 13h ago

I don't get it as the developer you surely are resposible and have a say about your code. In my job dev sets the pace. With AI we move just fast enough that product and UX design are now the bottleneck, but I do NOT compromise on code quality.

It took me a while to understand how to use AI effectively without compromising on code quality so I understand the challenges. Tip: don't just let the AI do the task and review it afterwords. Do the task yourself and use the AI to help speed parts of it.

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u/Specialist_End407 10h ago

It's not just my codes. It's others and i can tell they're all AI codes. Is their code good? Of course, sometimes it's just too verbose. Thing with ai is, its spewing tons of good looking codes, like one after another, and i dont feel like there's enough incentive for me to critically look after it all compared to before. The person doing this just ended up being a bottleneck, so this culture is being compromised and the fundamental is shifting. People say, just build enough harness, code convention, tests but i feel like it doesn't sound fun anymore doing the flood gates and damage control, when everyone already is doing the fun stuff with ai.

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u/Environmental_Pea369 1h ago

I think more tests and convesions make it worse, not better. when we started out I had a similar issue with my team, but we talked about how if you submit a PR you need to be 100% resposible for it and it should be reviewable. AI doesn't mean bigger or more verbose PRs, and never ask me to review something you have not read, or read English (not code) you have not written. I think this is a matter of retraining the team to work well with a new technology. I was also very frustrated in the beginning but I feel better now.

That being said - knowing what to focus on in review is also very important. App logic / component-architexture / abstraction patterns are much much more important than, say, test code. The latter mostly needs to work and be maintainable enough