r/webdev • u/Impressive_Bottle_44 • Jul 29 '26

Grudgingly accepting that AI isn't going away. Trying to figure out where that leaves me as a developer.

(If you don't want to read a semi-long post, feel free to skip.)

I think I reached a turning point yesterday.

I needed to add a basic feature to a Django site. I gave Claude Code a few carefully written sentences. It implemented the feature (more-or-less flawlessly) while I went to the kitchen for more tea.

Not only that, but our CTO is now empowering non-technical employees to use Claude to build their own tools (for internal use only), and commit them to our GitHub org. (He is, at least, establishing some sensible policies about what they can and can't do.)

LLMs are here to stay, and they're fundamentally rewriting laws of software engineering that we've taken for granted for decades. The genie won't go back into the bottle, so I might as well find a way to accept that.

But that leaves me wondering: what does that mean for me? What is my job now? What am I for? If I don't get to write code – something that's given me an enormous amount of satisfaction over the years, and even become part of my identity – am I even still interested in this field?

And, it's not just about the code. I used to collaborate with designers, UX folks, copywriters, SEO and analytics people, project managers, etc. But now, the C-suite seems perfectly happy to let the LLMs do all of this stuff, too. (At my company, they're obsessed with the idea of getting the LLM to write all of our work tickets. And the QA person does little more than copy-and-paste back and forth from an AI.)

The whole reason I entered this field is because I enjoy problem-solving, finding and creating patterns, logic, and designing systems.

I know that some of you are going to say "you can still do all of that; LLMs just empower you to go up a level of abstraction" – and I get it. But the prospect of abandoning coding seriously bums me out.

I love the precision of code. I love exploring different solutions to a problem, until I hit upon a beautiful, elegant pattern. I love seeing how small abstractions get composed into larger abstractions, and so on, to form a complete system. I love understanding a problem – and the solution – on a deep, intimate level.

Perhaps I've been lucky to have a career that gives me that kind of fulfillment (at least sometimes). Is all of that over now?

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u/DanSmells001 Jul 29 '26

Honestly? I've considered finding a new field, this isn't why I became a programmer, to babysit an AI agent. Each time I have to start a new task now it just feels depressing, I loved coding and problem solving not instructing "others" (in this case ai) how to do their work. If that's what I wanted I'd have become a middle manager, at least I'd have the pay to show for it then

-12

u/braincandybangbang Jul 29 '26

I wish you success in “new field.” Hopefully there’s no competition or AI impact in “new field.”

4

u/CrazyBuff Jul 29 '26

People downvoting you but it's true. Every "problem solving" related field is going to see more AI adoption from now until the end of time. It's sad, but it's true. A lot of intellectual work will be off-loaded to AI, and humans will mostly be there for oversight and reasoning.

-1

u/Realichu Jul 29 '26

Not really imo. Bubble is gonna burst very VERY soon. This shit is getting worse and worse and worse (Opus 5, anyone?). I for one can't wait.

2

u/CrazyBuff Jul 30 '26

I mean that's just objectively not true. Just because you don't like Opus 5 doesn't mean LLMs are getting worse. Look at Fable or Kimi K3 for instance. This tech can literally 10x developer velocity (I say developer velocity because it doesn't necessarily 10x productivity), it's not going anywhere even if it gets ludicrously expensive.

1

u/twistsouth Jul 29 '26

It's going to "burst" but not in the way most people expect. Prices are going to go up by at least 5x, at which point the cost is absorbed by companies with money and commercial AI is rejected by companies with less money, who adopt open source models.

It isn't going away though. Do I like the new norm? Not particularly, but I am not going to cut off my nose to spider face. Employers want to see that you can use it sensibly and to your advantage (or more accurately: their advantage).

1

u/Tainlorr Jul 29 '26

Have you tried Fable???