Yo, I'm heading up a brand-new community project.
-
Yo, I'm heading up a brand-new community project.
We write code by hand.
️It's a growing opt-in directory of software developers who write code by hand. When you hear someone tell you “nobody does that” you can point to this and say “well these folks do.”
If you're #ProCraft and care about the future of handcrafted software, please add yourself to the list! I'd love to see this grow to 100s of signatories (I know y'all are out there!) and really send a message.
@jaredwhite you might enjoy my post about #slowsoftware
-
S sam@social.data.coop shared this topic
-
@jaredwhite
I've worn out many keyboards & mice writing in the last 25 years.
Project proposals, manuals, history, programs and novels.
I've researched Chatbots since 1980s and the current LLMs using data scraped from the Internet & books are able to do a more realistic conversation due to astronomic amount of processing and (stolen) data. They are still toys. A dead end. There are more useful computer tools with an AI label.
I've managed programmers & engineers. Most programmers are poor.@jaredwhite
I got a Cherry TKL mechanical keyboard for my workstation (with RGB lights set to a dim white). The matt tops are getting shiny.I used to have a small UPS to have enough time to save my work. Laptops are far better than All-in-ones as the UPS is built in.
The UPS is replaced by a 3KW Solar UPS with 12 kWh of batteries and 8 panels. A separate one charged from main one feeds 3 freezers and has 4 panels. So all the computers, satellite gear, fibre & router & switches are on UPS.
-
To be fair, some of this can be remediated through use of local, open models, but I don't see local LLMs used much in workplaces and that still doesn't remediate all the harms. Maybe academia could surprise me and would put some focus there.
It still has issues that the hardware for local coding LLMs is by no means cheap, but academia still charges hundreds for books and had dedicated labs with high grade hardware for running CAD software when I went, so it's not unreasonable to do.
But also, from personal experience with the output, at a very mundane level it destroy comprehensibility of the code base and documentation. People will use LLMs to generate documentation that is voluminous but also is targeted towards other LLMs rather than human comprehension.
The net result is that even if a stated rule is that people will review and understand the code, that becomes functionally unachievable. This becomes doubly problematic when grappling with generated documentation for integrating components in a larger system. The code changes downstream then become larger than they needed to be because the documentation was more verbose and less comprehensible than it needed to be.
These are negative outcomes that I have seen in action.
-
Yo, I'm heading up a brand-new community project.
We write code by hand.
️It's a growing opt-in directory of software developers who write code by hand. When you hear someone tell you “nobody does that” you can point to this and say “well these folks do.”
If you're #ProCraft and care about the future of handcrafted software, please add yourself to the list! I'd love to see this grow to 100s of signatories (I know y'all are out there!) and really send a message.
@jaredwhite I'll add myself later if I don't forgor
-
@jaredwhite I assume that you mean without AI?
But with compilers on a computer and not with pen and paper.
What is the main motivation for not using LLMs as part of the development process?
I am asking mainly to understand as I am head of studies at a department of computer science and we are currently getting ready to put more coding with LLMs into courses.
@UlrikNyman @jaredwhite there are a myriad of reason: technical, practical, business, legal, environmental, political, ethical, psychological ... . take a look at the the work of Emily M Bender, Timnit Gebru, and Paris Marks (all on the fedi) for a more rigours go over the above
-
Yo, I'm heading up a brand-new community project.
We write code by hand.
️It's a growing opt-in directory of software developers who write code by hand. When you hear someone tell you “nobody does that” you can point to this and say “well these folks do.”
If you're #ProCraft and care about the future of handcrafted software, please add yourself to the list! I'd love to see this grow to 100s of signatories (I know y'all are out there!) and really send a message.
@jaredwhite Thanks for the great work you are doing.
Meanwhile,I am also practising food production and environmental conservation from Uganda with other people ,I being the founder of #GreenYouthaMovement .
Would you help in marketing our work such that we can be able to feed more vulnerable families,train more people about environmental conservation after setting up a large tree nursery that will help provide fruit tree seedlings to serve to the communities? -
@jaredwhite you might enjoy my post about #slowsoftware
-
@alexia @a5mjzrl6xj7kj34t@shrimp.starlightnet.work I think it's best to keep this to individuals, but if the "individual" is a sort of alias (not trying to enforce any "real name" policy), that's fine. We just want to make sure each entry is matched up to a real person at the end of the day.
-
@jaredwhite I assume that you mean without AI?
But with compilers on a computer and not with pen and paper.
What is the main motivation for not using LLMs as part of the development process?
I am asking mainly to understand as I am head of studies at a department of computer science and we are currently getting ready to put more coding with LLMs into courses.
@UlrikNyman @jaredwhite what does prompting a stochastic parrot have to do with the study of computer science?
Even if your program is less about theory and more about the tradecraft of programming, how does LLM use advance the students’ craftsmanship?
Unless you’re a trade school for a specific provider, the skills you impart should be general; what LLM-use skills generalize across providers?
What’s your plan for when investors stop subsidizing LLMs?
-
Yo, I'm heading up a brand-new community project.
We write code by hand.
️It's a growing opt-in directory of software developers who write code by hand. When you hear someone tell you “nobody does that” you can point to this and say “well these folks do.”
If you're #ProCraft and care about the future of handcrafted software, please add yourself to the list! I'd love to see this grow to 100s of signatories (I know y'all are out there!) and really send a message.
@jaredwhite oof, that signup process is not one I can do from a mobile mastodon app
-
@jaredwhite but what if someone does it with voice? It's "manual" then rather.
@wannabe_alarmist In the readme, I clarify that assistive technologies are totally fine. It doesn't have to be *literally* "by hand" just conceptually.
-
@arthfach if you don't want to sign up, DM the relevant details to me—that's fine too!
-
Yo, I'm heading up a brand-new community project.
We write code by hand.
️It's a growing opt-in directory of software developers who write code by hand. When you hear someone tell you “nobody does that” you can point to this and say “well these folks do.”
If you're #ProCraft and care about the future of handcrafted software, please add yourself to the list! I'd love to see this grow to 100s of signatories (I know y'all are out there!) and really send a message.
@jaredwhite i couldn't resist
https://codeberg.org/whitefusion/handcraftedcode.org/pulls/29 -
Yo, I'm heading up a brand-new community project.
We write code by hand.
️It's a growing opt-in directory of software developers who write code by hand. When you hear someone tell you “nobody does that” you can point to this and say “well these folks do.”
If you're #ProCraft and care about the future of handcrafted software, please add yourself to the list! I'd love to see this grow to 100s of signatories (I know y'all are out there!) and really send a message.
@jaredwhite I do a mix of both. For my work, I often find AI is useful for tedius tasks, which frees my time up to focus on coming up with solutions to a need/problem or implementing new tools, which I prefer to code by hand because it's fun and rewarding.
IDK if that makes me uneligible to sign since I do use AI or eligible since I do also hand code.
-
Yo, I'm heading up a brand-new community project.
We write code by hand.
️It's a growing opt-in directory of software developers who write code by hand. When you hear someone tell you “nobody does that” you can point to this and say “well these folks do.”
If you're #ProCraft and care about the future of handcrafted software, please add yourself to the list! I'd love to see this grow to 100s of signatories (I know y'all are out there!) and really send a message.
@jaredwhite oooo that sounds fun
-
Yo, I'm heading up a brand-new community project.
We write code by hand.
️It's a growing opt-in directory of software developers who write code by hand. When you hear someone tell you “nobody does that” you can point to this and say “well these folks do.”
If you're #ProCraft and care about the future of handcrafted software, please add yourself to the list! I'd love to see this grow to 100s of signatories (I know y'all are out there!) and really send a message.
I really like this.
I do admit I am wary of ostensibly pro-social things
becoming not pro-social, but I am also nerd sniped
because to add my name i have to do a PR (I assume).
(EDIT: https://codeberg.org/whitefusion/handcraftedcode.org/pulls/37 )
CC: @jaredwhite@indieweb.social
-
@jaredwhite I assume that you mean without AI?
But with compilers on a computer and not with pen and paper.
What is the main motivation for not using LLMs as part of the development process?
I am asking mainly to understand as I am head of studies at a department of computer science and we are currently getting ready to put more coding with LLMs into courses.
@UlrikNyman I do expect that to some extent AI may become a new level of abstraction. I do enjoy working in assembly or even in some cases toggling in raw instruction words on my Altair or SCELBI. Just as I enjoy high level coding in other contexts. I personally find the level of AI abstraction useful as well, but less rewarding. It's very interesting!
-
Unfortunate that the acronym AI is in use, otherwise you could deem yourselves "Actual Intelligence"
@misterscience @jaredwhite who cares just reclaim it 🧌 make the AI bros suffer
i, for one, use AI as an acronym for Ari Intelligence
-
Yo, I'm heading up a brand-new community project.
We write code by hand.
️It's a growing opt-in directory of software developers who write code by hand. When you hear someone tell you “nobody does that” you can point to this and say “well these folks do.”
If you're #ProCraft and care about the future of handcrafted software, please add yourself to the list! I'd love to see this grow to 100s of signatories (I know y'all are out there!) and really send a message.
There was a time when someone said, “I write code by hand”, he meant scratching out programmes in pencil on the unprinted backside of recycled 132-column printer paper roll.
It is commendable that, when the whole industry is mindlessly following those shifty AI code generators, you lot are perpetuating the traditional art of using the mind to craft programmes and reaffirming the classic dictum which held that programming is a mathematical act.
-
@jaredwhite I assume that you mean without AI?
But with compilers on a computer and not with pen and paper.
What is the main motivation for not using LLMs as part of the development process?
I am asking mainly to understand as I am head of studies at a department of computer science and we are currently getting ready to put more coding with LLMs into courses.
Assuming this is a genuine question, here are some reasons:
- keeping a planet we can live on
- antifascism
- respect for the work of creators
- not fond of speculative bubbles
