Cyborg Software Engineering
I write software as a hobby because it’s something I enjoy. But I don’t think I’ll continue to do so without the option to collaborate with AI.
AI still makes mistakes. That’s why, at this moment in time, I believe it’s best for experts.
My workflow includes Aider.chat in architect mode (/architect) to suggest a plan first. And I review every change - either in-flight as the changes are made or afterwards through review of the diffs in git.
Six months ago, I was accepting AI-proposed changes 20-30% of the time. Now, on the precipice of 2025, it’s 40-70%.
A key reason for this jump in acceptance rate is because of Anthropic’s Sonnet update on Ocober 22nd. And I do enjoy the architect mode of Aider where it proposes a plan using a “strong” model and then defers to a “weaker” model to prepare the code diffs.
By this time next year, I suspect I’ll be accepting AI-proposed code changes >80% of the time.
How will this shift affect the role of software engineering?
My current take is that we’ll see software engineers evolve to become more like product leaders who can code. As a consequence, we’ll have far fewer people writing code - with increased specialization of those who do.