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923 points zh2408 | 8 comments | | HN request time: 1.813s | source | bottom
1. amelius ◴[] No.43743668[source]
I've said this a few times on HN: why don't we use LLMs to generate documentation? But then came the naysayers ...
replies(3): >>43744382 #>>43744780 #>>43751203 #
2. tdy_err ◴[] No.43744382[source]
Alternatively, document your code.
replies(1): >>43744398 #
3. cushychicken ◴[] No.43744398[source]
Id have bought a lot of lunches for myself if I had a dollar for every time I’ve pushed my team for documentation and had it turn into a discussion of “Well, how does that stack up against other priorities?

It’s a pretty foolproof way for smart political operators to get out of a relatively dreary - but high leverage - task.

AI doesn’t complain. It just writes it. Makes the whole task a lot faster when a human is a reviewer for correctness instead of an author and reviewer.

4. runeks ◴[] No.43744780[source]
Useful documentation explains why the code does what it does. Ie. why is this code there?

An LLM can't magically figure out your motivation behind doing something a certain way.

replies(2): >>43745102 #>>43748933 #
5. johnnyyyy ◴[] No.43745102[source]
Are you implying that only the creator of the code can write documentation?
replies(1): >>43745807 #
6. oblio ◴[] No.43745807{3}[source]
No, they're saying that LLMs (and really, most other humans) can't really write the best documentation.

Frankly, most documentation is useless fluff. LLMs will be able to write a ton of that for sure :-)

7. bonzini ◴[] No.43748933[source]
Tell it the why of the API and ask it to write individual function and class docs then.
8. remoquete ◴[] No.43751203[source]
Because you can't. See my previous comment. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43748908