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Comment by Etheryte | Hacker News Reader

This is a pretty common take but I don't think it holds up to scrutiny. Generating new code is such a minuscule part of what I actually do as a developer that I only ever mention it in passing, if at all, when talking about my job. Defining requirements that somehow manage to make a compromise between what every different department wants, communicating our advantages and difficulties to relevant parties, customer meetings, figuring out what legal requirement this 10-year-old server's cron job fulfils, etc. These are all things I don't see any of these systems figuring out anytime soon and that's where the real value add is. Writing up a class that can be described in a few simple sentences is not where the money is made.

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This is where you separate the two classes of developers, I think. The ones that think their job is writing code, and the ones that see their job as coming up with solutions to problems.

If you think your job is just writing code, then yeah, you're about to get replaced. But if that was the case, then you would already have been replaced by an outsourced team of developers that can get things done cheaper than you.

We as developers are the conduit between what the business needs and what computers can do. We're translators, and not in the "we write code" sense. A non-developer won't be able to use GPT to write any non-trivial system because they won't have a clue what to ask for.

And if someone thinks "oh but they will one day be able to list their requirements exactly and GPT will just do it", I will ask: Well, why hasn't that taken off with offshore teams, then? The answer to that is exactly the answer to why GPT poses no risk to anyone's career: Stakeholders don't know what they need, and it's up to developers to figure it out.

> If you think your job is just writing code, then yeah, you're about to get replaced.

Honestly, even that would require major advancements, which is speculative at best. The last time I used Copilot to generate a few lines of code, there were three different mistakes. I spent much more time debugging than it would have taken me to just write the code myself.

It can do some things very well, but it fails all the time.

For the foreseeable future, I think we're firmly in the "this is just a tool" territory.

> This is where you separate the two classes of developers, I think. The ones that think their job is writing code, and the ones that see their job as coming up with solutions to problems.

The BLS data has some insights into how the government regarded different job titles over the years.

The current one:

https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_stru.htm#15-0000

has "Computer Programmers" https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes151251.htm

> Create, modify, and test the code and scripts that allow computer applications to run. Work from specifications drawn up by software and web developers or other individuals. May develop and write computer programs to store, locate, and retrieve specific documents, data, and information.

and "Software Developers" https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes151252.htm

> Research, design, and develop computer and network software or specialized utility programs. Analyze user needs and develop software solutions, applying principles and techniques of computer science, engineering, and mathematical analysis. Update software or enhance existing software capabilities. May work with computer hardware engineers to integrate hardware and software systems, and develop specifications and performance requirements. May maintain databases within an application area, working individually or coordinating database development as part of a team.

---

This seems to match your views too.

2021:

https://web.archive.org/web/20210318001704/https://www.bls.g...

    15-1251  Computer Programmers
    15-1256  Software Developers and Software Quality Assurance Analysts and Testers
    15-1257  Web Developers and Digital Interface Designers

2018: https://web.archive.org/web/20180201194340/https://www.bls.g...

Had

    15-1131  Computer Programmers
    15-1132  Software Developers, Applications
    15-1133  Software Developers, Systems Software
    15-1134  Web Developers

2010: https://web.archive.org/web/20100407174731/http://www.bls.go...

    15-1021  Computer Programmers
    15-1031  Computer Software Engineers, Applications
    15-1032  Computer Software Engineers, Systems Software

If you look through that year by year, you can see the job title inflation.

> This is a pretty common take but I don't think it holds up to scrutiny. Generating new code is such a minuscule part of what I actually do as a developer

Yes, generating new code is a fairly small part of my job too. But this is also a pretty common take re ai.

Maybe I'm wrong, but generative ai seems to be eating human capabilities for breakfast right now, and we're only ~8 months in. Today it can do a small part of a small part of my job, and rather more of a junior dev's job, but where are we going to be in five years time? I'd quite like to still have a paying job over that timescale.

People used to think that creating art or music or playing go or whatever, were activities that required a human meatbrain. Turns out its all just (effectively) a bunch of parametric equations. What if the non-coding skills you list will be similarly amenable/vulnerable to automation by ai?

> creating art or music or playing go

One of these things is not like the others

They all remain examples of tasks that were widely asserted to be beyond a mere computer, and yet can now be done better by a mere computer than by the median human.

(I'm not actually sure which of those three you were singling out and why; they're all different in their own ways).

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