Yes and this is my biggest anxiety of future software and interfaces to come. You won't remember how you got there or did what because there are n permutations of getting there or doing that, except they're vaguely similar but not exactly the same thing. I too want predictable software (including UIs) that stays the same until I want to change/upgrade it myself as a user.

I think you are right in the 'current paradigm' of what software is at the moment, where users are using a fixed set of functionality in the way that the developer intended, but there is a new breed of software where the functionality set can't be defined in an exhaustive way.

Take Claude Code - after I've described my requirement it gives me a customised UI that asks me to make choices specific to what I have asked it to build (usually a series of dropdown lists of 3-4 options). How would a static UI do that in a way that was as seamless?

The example used in the article is a bit more specific but fair - if you want to calculate the financial implications of a house purchase in the 'old software paradigm' you probably have to start by learning excel and building a spreadsheet (or using a dodgy online calculator someone else built, which doesn't match your use case). The spreadsheet the average user writes might be a little simplified - are we positive that they included stamp duty and got the compounding interest right? Wouldn't it be great if Excel could just give you a perfectly personalised calculator, with toggle switches, without users needing to learn =P(1+(k/m))^(mn) but while still clearly showing how everything is calculated? Maybe Excel doesn't need to be a tool which is scary - it can be something everyone can use to help make better decisions regardless of skill level.

So yes, if you think of software only doing what it has done in the past, Gen UI does not make sense. If you think of software doing things it has never done before we need to think of new interaction modes (because hopefully we can do something better than just a text chat interface?).

Consider Google's search results page (setting aside the ads and dark patterns for a moment) as a form of generative UI.

You enter a term, and depending on what you entered, you get a very different UI.

"best sled for toddler" -> search modifiers (wood, under $20, toboggan, etc.), search options, pictures of sleds for sale from different retailers, related products, and reviews.

"what's a toboggan" -> AI overview, Wikipedia summary, People Also Ask section, and a block of short videos on toboggans.

"directions to mt. trashmore" -> customized map of my current location to Mt. Trashmore (my local sledding hill)

Google has spent an immense amount of time and effort identifying the underlying intent behind all kinds of different searches and shows very different "UI" for each in a way makes a very fluid kind of sense to users.

Yeah, additionally imagine supporting something like that: "Yeah, I cannot reproduce your issue because things on my end look different". A nightmare for sure.

I think the problem is having to "learn" software in the first place. You don't have to "learn" how to work with a good accountant or lawyer. They make it easy by exposing what they can offer precisely when you need it.

That's how I think software will work in the future. I'm not suggesting that the UI should be completely different on every render. Some predictability is essential. That's one reason I don't think codegen on every render is worthwhile. I'm simply suggesting that software should look different from user to user based on their individual needs.

> I want it to just work; that kind of design takes effort & there's no way around it

Nothing "just works" for everyone. You are a product of your environment, people say apple interfaces/OSX are intuitive, I found them utterly unusable until I was forced to spend a lot of time to learn them.

Depending on which software you grew up using, you either find it intuitive or don't. If you found someone that has never used technology, no modern UI would be intuitive.

Personally, I hate it when software that I have to use daily is not configurable (and ideally extensible via programming). It's basically designed for the lowest common denominator for some group of users that product/design groups have decided is "intuitive".

> People hate UI redesigns for a reason...

I do agree here, stop changing things for the sake of changing things. When I owned some internal tools, I would go out of my way to not break user workflows. Even minor things, like tab-order, which I think most people don't think about, I'd have browser automation tests to make sure they remained consistent.

Terrible article, poorly written by someone obviously fishing for clout

Ehhhh....

Is an AI driven feed not UI changes? Those are incredibly successful but the buttons change every refresh.

UIs do not need to be static. The key is that there is a coherent pattern to what's changing.

When you look at it through that lens it doesn't seem so exotic.