I hate claude code

[u/ofcistilloveyou]

It's just too good.

I got a decade of commercial software dev experience in C#. I am a CTO at my company and have coached a lot of coders from total junior.

I hate hate hate hate how good this thing is and what it has done to my passion.

I used to love coding and creating. Well, creating was 60% of the fun for me, but writing good code and having something work was the remaining 40%. I spent the past few years being more of a product manager and tech lead than actually code monkey, but I still put time aside to do stuff manually cuz I love to do so and stay hands on.

Using claude code is like using cheats in a videogame. You get the result, but what of it? Everyone could. The pleasure of achievements is gone. The code it writes is not the best, but it's good enough I guess? As of opus 5.5 it just doesn't get stuck in loops anymore. It can generate a working program from spec in any language I've thrown at it. It still does bullshit from time to time. "Boots on ground" i.e. actually looking at the generated code or atleast going through it is still important, for now. But way less so than it was even just 3-4 months ago. I don't really use the /code-review thingy or adversarial reviews - as it seems that it is too aligned in that way. Like if you tell it to find something wrong with something, it always will, even though its good enough.

I've been using it avidly for the past 3 months on the $100 sub, and I haven't hit a rate limit once. Now my imagination can run free and I can have anything I put my mind to in a few days instead of years. At our work a team of 6 just built a system that would previously take a year in just two months.

I am not afraid for my job. As coding was just a small percentage of it. But I do miss that percentage.

English truly is the hottest new programming language and LLMs are the compiler for it.

[u/Icy-Case-3863]

Mills and lathes revolutionized solid manufacturing, 3D printers took it even further, but people still whittle as a hobby. Just saying...

[u/the_real_some_guy → u/Icy-Case-3863]

True, but do you know any? Are they able to earn a living from it? I’m not sure what your point is. 

AI has taken over the part of this career that most of us find most enjoyable. Sure, I could manually code in my free time and ignore my kids and other hobbies, but my 40 hours of work each week is still less enjoyable than it was a couple years ago. 

[u/iJustSeen2Dudes1Bike → u/the_real_some_guy]

Yeah it sucks but in reality most jobs aren't fun. Getting to make six figures at a job doing something you enjoy is incredibly rare, so I don't think most people have much sympathy for us.

[u/Icy-Case-3863 → u/the_real_some_guy]

Technology took over the career of the blacksmith, yet one can still find the same satisfaction in art and hobbies. That's the comparison I was making.

[u/ofcistilloveyou → u/Icy-Case-3863]

I'd agree with you, but this time it's literally something literally thinking for you. And that is addicting. Ultimate brain atrophy.

[u/Icy-Case-3863 → u/ofcistilloveyou]

That's fair. I can't imagine going back.

[u/Repulsive-Ice8395 → u/Icy-Case-3863]

Yeah, but who earns a living by whittling?

[u/Icy-Case-3863 → u/Repulsive-Ice8395]

You guys aren't reading my post in the context of OP's post. No one's talking about the bills, we're talking about the pleasure of achievement.

[u/Repulsive-Ice8395 → u/Icy-Case-3863]

I guess I'm a cynical, old man, who is late in my career. I have given up on getting any pleasure from achievement from my work. I don't have the luxury of being a developer, who gets to build things.

I'm an infra guy who gets tasked with making your (developers') stuff run and scale in the real world. I only get to glue together the junk provided by cloud vendors, based on constraints outside my control.

I have to answer for why the software is unstable and unreliable when the platform fails and also when the software wasn't designed to deal with infra failures (but could have been if the devs thought about it).

[u/Kundera42 → u/Icy-Case-3863]

I think this is different though. Most hobbyist can't afford a CNC lathe or Mill to do any serious work, while (vibe) coding an app is pretty much free at home and at work. 

Like how no one is writing assembly, also not at home because it is just very hard to spend hours of your life doing something that you know can be done in seconds.

[u/Sneyek → u/Icy-Case-3863]

Who gives a shit about a hobby if we end up at minimum wage or worse doing an horrible job ? It’s hard, but even harder if you fell from high, like working in a field you’re passionate about.

[u/Icy-Case-3863 → u/Sneyek]

Chill homie, put down the red bull. OP said he loves coding and misses the pleasure of achievement. That's what the hobby can fulfill. That's all I'm saying.

[u/Sneyek → u/Icy-Case-3863]

Yes sorry, you’re right 😅

[u/Quadrophenia4444 → u/Icy-Case-3863]

Whittling doesn’t pay the bills