Something’s Changed

In the past couple of months of this year, the implications of advances in AI, (specifically the power of Claude Code as an AI model + harness combination,) has completely up-ended my job description and my career, and this post is about what I want you to know about it. (Assuming somehow you don’t know already, though I’m somewhat guessing you’ve already experienced the same thing, and probably do already know.)

Frontmatter

Yeah, I know this is a climbing blog, and I know this is off-topic, but it’s a thing I felt the need to write about and post somewhere publicly, and this happened to be the most convenient avenue I had available.

Also: my day-job is software engineering, and I am primarily thinking about other software engineers as the audience here. (And, this article is specific to this point in time. It’ll probably all be completely different a year from now.) Not that you have to be a software engineer to read any of this, and there probably are a few interesting nuggets in here no matter what it is that you do to pay the bills, I just wanted to be upfront so you can decide if this is relevant to you.

And finally: this article is probably a bit behind the curve, because I’ll bet something like 60% of software engineers have already been exposed to this & figured all this out, but I’m writing this anyway, just in case it helps anyone in that 40%. Those are the people I’m writing this for. Just in case you (somehow) haven’t jumped on board (or been run over by) this train yet: Then you need to know. And that’s why I’m taking the time to write this, just in case it helps.

1. Something’s Changed
2. Frontmatter
3. I’ve been vaguely skeptical / uninvested in AI. Until Now.
   1. The “Stack Overflow Replacement” era
   2. The “Primitive-Paired-Programming-Partner” Era
   3. The “It’s basically a junior-dev working for me” era
4. About that hype…
5. What Claude Code is, and some structural AI Basics & Terminology
6. How to Get Good Results out of Claude Code
7. Helping AI simulate Long-Term Memory
   1. Claude Code’s built-in “AI Primitive” file types. (Its default “rigging” types.)
   2. About My Additional “Rigging”
8. I have a new job-description now
9. What does this all imply for the world ahead?
10. My Past-Life in Tech
11. Footnote

Fundamentally, AI code assistants act as a kind of amplifier. If you’re already doing the right things, AI will amplify the impact of those. If you’re already doing the wrong things, AI will help you to dig a deeper hole faster. Tools amplify capability, they don’t replace it.

– Dave Farley

I’ve been vaguely skeptical / uninvested in AI. Until Now.

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