Given how quickly things evolve, it’s easy to get lost in the numerous offerings and hard to get the best deal. So, what do you use? Both clients/harnesses and LLM providers or local setups would be interesting.
Personally, I’ve been using opencode with Github copilot for work. I’m currently looking for cost-effective provider for personal work. Maybe openrouter with one of the cheap models?
If you forgot to write good code and good architecture, in a span of what, at most, a year, then you were never a good engineer to begin with.
That’s not how a brain works.
People forget the language they grew up reading/writing/speaking simply because they stopped using it.
That’s… precisely how the brain works.
We’re not talking language specifics here. We’re talking about core principles of software engineering - principles that can be applied easily to other aspects of life. We’re talking about patterns, concepts, best practices.
Things that one needs to utilise daily even with AI generated code - that is, unless you’re checking in whatever the AI writes with zero review.
They actually do, and unless you talk in code this is more akin to a second or third language, not the one you grew up with. I have personally noticed how after a year or so of using the rng machine I simply could not code without AI, and am now lucky to be rehabilitating myself. There are already serious studies about the deskilling effect, this IS how it works. “AI” (meaning the LLMs now thrown at every thinking problem) is a lazy enshittifying tool.
I do not use AI to code; but I have been programming for two generations now.
I’ve taken a few breaks in that time, and switched technologies at least ten times also, and it’s very easy for me to forget a lot.
Programming is like any skill, it requires constant practice.
Am I a good programmer? Probably not that skilled, but I’ve written over a million lines of code and have run the gamut of architecture from: “Break this large file into 500 lines each, now we call that as a function” to “all numbers are object oriented” to “if it works great”
I was worth every penny I earned 4 years ago. 1 year ago, I had to open documentation for C++ features I use for a decade. I could not remember how it works.
Your brain is a muscle, and sure, I had more time to teach, but I got worse at teaching because I got worse at doing
Not remembering specifics of a technology, and completely forgetting the base building blocks - the same blocks that you should be using for AI generated code too, BECAUSE YOU NEED TO FUCKING REVIEW IT - is not the same.
I’m an Android engineer by trade. I might not be able to give you the exact interface definition of a BroadcastReceiver, or explain in technical terms the core differences between a TextureView and a SurfaceView (that’s what the documentation is for!), but for sure as hell can tell you if your architecture is good or not, or if the quality of the code you wrote is shite.
If I can’t remember a specific interface I can not judge if would be the right tool for the given job. Using suboptimal tools is bad architecture for me.
That’s just a simple example.
It took me about 8 weeks to get back up to my old productivity, and suddenly code that looked perfectly fine from agent backed project’s give me nightmares.
Not remembering an interface is easily alleviated.
Forgetting core architectural principles - which are the cornerstone of good architecture - cannot be fixed that easily.
Micro details, specifics, are what the docs are for. You don’t need to remember the specifics as long as you have the understanding of what the thing does.
Macro details - appropriate information and event pipelines, SOLID, KISS, etc., are what architecture is about. You can write the best micro-scope code if the end result on a macro level is spaghetti that would feed Rome for a year.