alt Hacker NewsWhat's an int vs a float vs a boolean? What's a function? What's a class? What's a variable? You don't actually need to know the answer to those questions in order to vibe code. That's a lot of priors to update!
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When I started I learnt something about coding from VBA macros to automate excel.
Often that started with the macro recorder. Then you worked out what that "recorded" code/sludge did, removed the crud you didn't need or want, improved the logic and so on. I bought books to understand it better. Now you can ask a (different) LLM "what is this? why is it used? How would I?" etc which is probably a faster learning curve than books, newsgroups and old school personal home pages with good info.
I would have been quite surprised when I first used a VBA macro in anger just how far I would go down the rabbit hole. C, asm, verilog, Linux were no part of what I originally signed up for!
Some people will specialise in the equivalent of recording macros and go no further. And this will be fine for code that gets it done but doesn't matter too much in the other dimensions (security, reliability, usefulness without the authors' support, etc.) Much like VBA utilities inside companies that were useful way back when. Other people will want what they produce to be better, even good, and they will learn about floating point [1] and all the rest, much as I did. Probably learn pretty fast too. [2]
[1] https://docs.oracle.com/cd/E19957-01/806-3568/ncg_goldberg.h...
[2] Working out how to write an excel vba webserver and using it to collect and and collate summary data from various divisions into reports was seedy as hell, solved the actual business problem (given ridiculous but intractable constraints) and isn't something you can record. We all have stories from a misspent youth that we're simultaneously ashamed and yet somehow proud of.
And, you don't have to vibe code. A competent developer can make great use of AI. I think a developer that can develop the system themselves is the most accelerated user.
> You don't actually need to know the answer to those questions in order to vibe code
No, but you do need to know the answer to respond to that 3AM page about prod being down.
Just to go on record, as of today, I’m a big believer that a person that knows all that stuff is much more productive with AI-coding than a person who doesn’t.
I have no idea how we can get people motivated to learn these through trial-and-error when AI coding exists though. I remember the days of spending hours on stupid bugs that AI can resolve within a minute. But I recall learning heavily from those experiences. Oh well…