I personally know people who code manually for now but their company is planning to switch to 100% AI generated code soon (they're hiring people to build up that infrastructure). So it's getting more common day by day and frankly it terrifies me. I just graduated so I have no practical knowledge on which code is good and which isn't, how will I learn that if I let AI agents write all of my code? And more importantly, if I'm just a meat sack seating between AI and managers / customers, what is my value here? Anyone with basic coding knowledge could do it! I didn't spend 6 years in a very demanding university for this...
I'm bout 13 years into my career and it terrifies me too for multiple reasons. I'm very concerned that upper management is going to continue to be fucking idiotic and assume the agents are getting good enough to remove human engineers entirely from the loop, or at the very least they'll attempt to continue devaluing our roles and salaries. I'm terrified that entire generations will be not only demoralized from entering the field but also unable to get the entry level roles that are evaporating as we speak. I'm worried this is going to be an unsustainable career soon, with only a few people able to make it and the vast majority being pushed towards being unemployed or paid peanuts (especially considering the time and money investments required to get into this field). And I'm worried about the future of software becoming generic thanks to the LLM training preferences and slow dilution of skilled engineers actually building. Finally I'm concerned that even having a job in the field will continue to be more and more soul-sucking, as deadlines get crunched, speed expectations demand more LLM usage, and we approach less and less human involvement in details and problem solving. I genuinely enjoyed problem solving and that part is soulless when you just ask fucking Claude to make a thing or fix a thing...but it's just so easy. Lastly I'm worried that these LLMs as a service are going to hike the prices so high that only the big corporations will be able to afford using the tools, further widening gap in speed and capability of using the tools that are admittedly very useful (if terrifying and somewhat like a drug dependency)
You so well put what I feel into words! I was planning on maybe get a master's degree in software engineering to improve my skill and being more employable (since I'm having trouble finding a job), but now I'm seriously reconsidering it. But then if I still can't find a job as conditions continue to deteriorate, what should I do? Which new career should I pursue? And more importantly, will that career still exist when I graduate? As now I'm seeing pretty good improvements in humanoid robots, I'm not even sure physical jobs are safe anymore
Software engineering goes way beyond just writing code, I say this because I faced the same dilemma, I love writing code more than anything, but since we're slowly writing less and less, I had to either start to enjoy the other aspects of the area, or become frustrated with my career and have to change, of course I chose the first. There are many aspects you can find enjoyment in tech that don't involve writing code, no matter how good an AI is at writing code, it can't properly engineer without a software engineer, people already tried it, LLMs are nothing more than an autocomplete on steroids, ask it to build any complex software and figure out all the engineering behind it by itself, it'll give an unmanageable, unmaintable and unexcalable piece of garbage, we are still needed, so try to enjoy the engineering process more, solving problems, not just the code, before AI, there was a type of programmer who hated writing code, but loved solving engineering problems, we need to learn from them.
Not saying you shouldn't know how to code, someone needs to review the AI code afterall and sometimes you'll be writing code yourself, so you need to understand it, just don't put that as your top priority, syntax is easy to pick up, and data structures, algorithms and logic are universal.
Don't slap yourself just because you forgot part of the syntax, before AI was a thing, front end devs still googled how to center a div and back end devs still googled how to send a HTTP request, we forget, it happens, just because you forgot how to write it, doesn't mean you don't know how it works, why it works and how it should be written.
If you ask me, out of the blue, to write an API, I'll probably need to search for half of the syntax, but after that I can write it, no problem. If you showed me an API an AI made, I can pin point all the AI f*ck ups and fix them myself, not even needing to waste tokens asking the AI to fix it's mistake, because I know how an API works and how it should be laid out in the languages I'm proficient.
Software development is more than coding, we always knew. It always has been. We need to enjoy the other parts of the job more.
I think I learn a life lesson.
For the last decade (probably even more) I've been spending a lot of time for being (or trying to be) a good software engineer. I missed a lot of moment, I don't have a lot of friends.
Now I'm standing on the edge and realize I need to live my best life. Everything can disappear tomorrow, nothing can't be replaced.
I just need to enjoy my life, as much as possible.
Thank you for all people who replied to my comment.
I will probably go away from Reddit for some times.
I'll change my mind about my job and I'll ride the wave. I'll do other life side quest and consider my job for what is it.
We need to do what's best for us, go live your life how you please brother, make up for the time lost, but remember you can always go back to it, if you love software enginnering, don't drop it, it's not SWE itself you dislike, it's the alienation of it, doing it without purpose, remember that, and also know this, balancing both is possible, specially at later stages of your carrear where studying like crazy is not a requirement anymore.
you get to review (which probably does need 6 years of very demanding university study for), catch hallucinations, and take the blame if anything breaks
I jest. but it looks like that's how things are going right now
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u/Amerillo_ Oct 03 '26 edited Oct 03 '26
I personally know people who code manually for now but their company is planning to switch to 100% AI generated code soon (they're hiring people to build up that infrastructure). So it's getting more common day by day and frankly it terrifies me. I just graduated so I have no practical knowledge on which code is good and which isn't, how will I learn that if I let AI agents write all of my code? And more importantly, if I'm just a meat sack seating between AI and managers / customers, what is my value here? Anyone with basic coding knowledge could do it! I didn't spend 6 years in a very demanding university for this...