When will we get a simple-to-use AI tool that...

[BeBMan]

...allows amateurs like you* and me to do fancy coding like programmers can without that we need to learn the actuall skillZ?


*"you" as far you're not a skilled coder already


I mean we have those AI chat tools, image generators based on this, and whatnot. So would it not be obvious to have AI tools doing the coding for us just based on a description what we want to achieve?

Of course learned coders and/or sentient AIs may conspire against this, since neither of those wants to compete against a myriad of n00bs who turned insta-coders by relying on AI.


Seriously, is something like this on the horizon?

[Dauphin]

It exists, and I use it regularly. In the past I would search Google for a function or a guide on how the function works. Now AI just copy pastes the coding examples into a convenient code segment, with the page it stole the code from.

Still buggy and imperfect, but better than having to read through multiple stackoverflow threads to find what I am after.

If you want to create something novel, or niche. I've found that it's not very helpful.

[Lorizael]

It exists, and I use it regularly. In the past I would search Google for a function or a guide on how the function works. Now AI just copy pastes the coding examples into a convenient code segment, with the page it stole the code from.

Yep, same. Much faster.

But I don't know if this makes coding exactly easy for non-coders. It still hallucinates and doesn't always understand the logic of what you ask it, so if you're not a practiced coder yourself, you might not notice when it's being stupid. Sometimes you can follow up with, "I said to do X but your code doesn't work because bla bla bla," and invariably it will reply with something like, "You're right, my apologies. Here's the code to do X." But my experience is that if your problem is novel or complex enough, and your dialogue starts exceeding the context window such that it forgets the initial prompt, it will essentially never be able to give you the correct answer.

[Geronimo]

It exists, and I use it regularly. In the past I would search Google for a function or a guide on how the function works. Now AI just copy pastes the coding examples into a convenient code segment, with the page it stole the code from.

Still buggy and imperfect, but better than having to read through multiple stackoverflow threads to find what I am after.

If you want to create something novel, or niche. I've found that it's not very helpful.

I think it's worth while to try this from any skill level using freely available AI tools. It definitely beats self teaching using previously freely available tools. Given the bizarre tasks they've helped me with I don't think it just copy pasted from a source it stole from in most, let alone all case. This, especially since I always reverse search after and find nothing. Though that could just reflect my poor searching skills.

[BeBMan]

In the past I would search Google for a function or a guide on how the function works.

Seems I'm still stuck in the past

Do you have a recommendation for such an AI tool? Or is it just ChatGPT based

Otherwise I'll do... a Google search

[BeBMan]

On a totally unrelated note someone started to use AI to generate photorealistic images of space aliens. Which has nothing to do wit t he Op, but there are plenty of nice pics: https://xenobiologymuseum.com

[Lorizael]

ChatGPT is what I use. It will even format your code so it looks all pretty. It's possible there are other LLMs more geared toward that, though.

[BeBMan]

Thanks, I try to figure this out. I don't have much to do in this regard, and probably will never be a great coder, but it's nice to be able to do at least a couple of things (hopefully) without crying for help elsewhere

[Dauphin]

I think it's worth while to try this from any skill level using freely available AI tools. It definitely beats self teaching using previously freely available tools. Given the bizarre tasks they've helped me with I don't think it just copy pasted from a source it stole from in most, let alone all case. This, especially since I always reverse search after and find nothing. Though that could just reflect my poor searching skills.

For what I use it for, I can tell where it came from because the coding is very specific. For example, I may ask how to set up an API feed from a specific website, and the response will be the one example that sets out how to do it. Plus it cites the source pages it uses, so you can compare yourself directly.