alt.hn

4/11/2026 at 11:24:41 AM

Now is the best time to write code by hand

 https://sitebloom.ch/writing/now-is-the-best-time-to-write-code-by-hand/

by nickgreg

4/12/2026 at 1:29:24 AM

Practicing code specifically is one of many options for engineers right now. How about other skills? For example, now seems like a good opportunity to start developing deep knowledge in a particular domain, so that when you build AI assisted software in that space, you’re competent enough to know if it’s doing the right thing. Or, develop a better understanding of a range of disciplines, so that when you go to solve problems, you’re aware of them and have more areas to draw from. (The combination is what Valve calls a T-shaped employee I believe.) Also a good opportunity to develop your interpersonal skills.

by elephanlemon

4/12/2026 at 6:31:19 AM

I agree. I think the rapid learning generalist has a real advantage right now, but that kind of advantage cannot be leveraged by big companies structured to utilise specialists. I think that's why individual contributors in big teams aren't seeing massive benefits from AI where a small team or solo developer may be seeing greater leverage.

If you are a strong generalist with an entrepreneurial spirit, I think I would be aiming at getting hired by a small company where you can provide a buttload of value or looking at starting something where you have domain experience outside of software.

by ehnto

4/12/2026 at 6:49:04 AM

> I think that's why individual contributors in big teams aren't seeing massive benefits from AI where a small team or solo developer may be seeing greater leverage.

This rings true. It is the best time ever for small teams. A big team is potentially several smaller teams, so this can be a force multiplier for them too.

Another force multiplier for reorganizing larger teams, be willing to consider smaller teams starting with single contributors.

What this is the worst time for: slow adaptation.

by Nevermark

4/12/2026 at 6:46:41 AM

Generalists are more competent by definition, but large companies don’t need broad competence, they just need a cog.

by sph

4/11/2026 at 9:22:58 PM

Totally agree. Especially for commercial or code that adds value. Writing code is just one element of developing quality, robust, software. In the rea world, commercial or production software must be maintained, supported, and must respond to changing user requirements. The human element is critical, unless you’re OK with relying on LLM’s, crossing your fingers, and have no care to support users.

by bvan

4/11/2026 at 11:51:18 PM

What I've been noticing is the abundance of the same "revolutionary" idea spoon fed by claude to everyone and their mom.

Coding gives the edge in creativity

by hoppp

4/12/2026 at 7:42:29 AM

I don't know, when I started out as a web developer I met a hardcore C developer once and I was quite impressed about his low level knowledge, and wanted to eventually learn that too. But as time passed by the web world kept developping and becoming more interesting and eventually I want to make applications in the end. A few years later I saw the guy again and he told me he got into Ruby on Rails businesses, because there was a lot of work in there.

by gitaarik

4/11/2026 at 7:36:26 PM

Yes, I only want hand crafted, artisanal, small-batch, free-range, organic code.

by cerealizer

4/12/2026 at 6:40:29 AM

This but unironically. Keep your mass-produced slop for yourself, show me what you have built with effort.

I spent two days learning about quaternions to fix a buggy spaceship moving in space, when an LLM could have done it for me in seconds. A great use of my time: now I understand quaternions and I have levelled up in my knowledge, which makes me more confident to tackle larger problems in this space.

by sph

4/11/2026 at 9:40:52 PM

You forgot locally sourced, single origin, fair trade, cholesterol free.

by contingencies

4/11/2026 at 10:08:54 PM

And vegan of course

by eulgro

4/12/2026 at 6:43:51 AM

Ew. Vibecoded slop is vegan: no biological life was involved during its creation.

by sph

4/12/2026 at 7:08:16 AM

And just like that, history has been erased.

by ares623

4/11/2026 at 11:54:12 PM

code written by grass fed developer, grade A.

Codyu.

by coolThingsFirst

4/12/2026 at 12:38:16 AM

and prose, and sketching.

All these things (code, prose, sketching) are about thinking through making.

by somewhereoutth

4/12/2026 at 7:07:28 AM

I know brain atrophy is mentioned a lot these days. But is anyone worried about early onset dementia? If we see a higher number of younger dementia patients needing care in the next few decades, once again it will be the next generation who will bear the burden just so the current generation can do the "lulz". Jesus tap-dancing Christ the job wasn't even that hard in the first place.

by ares623

4/11/2026 at 7:08:09 PM

Is the purpose of this article to say "If you only do one thing, you will likely not excel at other things"? Is there anyone to which this is not an obvious conclusion? Did I miss the point?

by sigseg1v

4/11/2026 at 11:04:20 PM

I think you did. The argument (which may be wrong) is that agentic coding has a lower barrier to entry than hand-coding, and that since (barring AGI) there will remain a demand for hand-coding, that skill will become more valuable the more developers lose it, while agentic coding due to its lower barrier to entry will become less valuable.

by layer8

4/12/2026 at 9:58:52 AM

It sounds like PHP and JavaScript all over again. The barrier was low and a lot of slop was produced by their users. Eventually due to huge demand, a lot of sophisticated things emerged (think V8, various frameworks, other browser gymnastics and evolving standards, etc).

by herewulf

4/12/2026 at 9:03:40 AM

Couldn't have said it better myself

by nickgreg

4/11/2026 at 9:22:01 PM

You did.

The point is if you let something think about x for you you will become worse at thinking about x.

by ofjcihen

4/12/2026 at 1:13:56 AM

The purpose of the article is to say that the skill of software engineering depends on the ability to write code by hand, even now that you don't necessarily have to on a day to day basis. If you don't keep in practice, the author thinks, you will become less effective even at driving agents than people who do.

Is that true? I'm not quite as confident as the author, but it seems plausible. I've seen a number of managers who used to write code try and fail to drive Claude as well as even the junior engineers reporting to them.

by SpicyLemonZest

4/11/2026 at 6:48:25 PM

such a bad take.

by oliver236

4/11/2026 at 10:10:42 PM

I think you'd have to start with 55+ years old and go upward to find an age range where more than 10% of programmers routinely wrote assembler code in their careers.

To find the same for machine code you'd need to start at 65 or older.

by tedd4u

4/11/2026 at 10:15:03 PM

change that 10% to 0.5% and I would agree. i am 62, worked in low level coding and hw interfacing. 'routinely' not even; i would say on occasion, needed to look at a bit, or even more rare, had to write a bit (like a small module)

by budman1

4/11/2026 at 10:50:23 PM

Curious, what do you normally use? I had to write a few timing sensitive MC drivers and the only way I knew how onto do that reliably was using assembly. But granted, it wasn't _often_, just more than I expected (especially for someone who doesn't normally do that low level stuff, this was for an art project)

by spoiler

4/11/2026 at 11:09:12 PM

sure. timing sensitive stuff. < 50 lines. jump back to C as soon as the critical stuff is over.

'performance stuff'. i try to solve it in C for a bunch of reasons; others readability is one. almost never need to do more than a short macro of assembly embedded in C.

the actual most use of have for assembly is "what is happening here.." and need to ask the debugger for the assembly for some deeper understanding.

Some years, did these things 5 times, so maybe 20 hours. Other years, never.

As far as "sit down and write some assembly to solve problem X", the answer is never. (except when X is right in the middle of the above items)

by budman1

4/11/2026 at 11:28:09 PM

Yeah, my father is now 70, I do remember he wrote assembly language in the late 80s but not since.

by shric

4/12/2026 at 12:46:31 AM

Really not the same. Assembly / machine code is entirely deterministic - they are a notation for your thoughts. LLM produced content is more a smorgasbord of other people's thoughts, and cannot help you with clarity, conviction, etc etc.

by somewhereoutth

4/12/2026 at 1:23:01 AM

Yes Assembly is deterministic (barring severe hardware bugs). But that's the point. People are no longer writing Assembly.

by lmz

4/12/2026 at 7:45:16 AM

They meant to say that swithing from assembly to high-level programming is not the same as switching from high-level programming to LLMs, because the latter loses you the guarantee that the computer will do what you told it to.

by xigoi

4/12/2026 at 1:46:16 AM

39 and have over 10 years writing assembly. huh?

by sitzkrieg