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We put a coding agent in a while loop

(github.com)
425 points sfarshid | 3 comments | 24 Aug 25 16:18 UTC | HN request time: 0.443s | source
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NitpickLawyer ◴[24 Aug 25 16:36 UTC] No.45005604[source]▶
> After finishing the port, most of the agents settled for writing extra tests or continuously updating agent/TODO.md to clarify how "done" they were. In one instance, the agent actually used pkill to terminate itself after realizing it was stuck in an infinite loop.

Ok, now that is funny! On so many levels.

Now, for the project itself, a few thoughts:

- this was tried before, about 1.5 years ago there was a project setup to spam github with lots of "paper implementations", but it was based on gpt3.5 or 4 or something, and almost nothing worked. Their results are much better.

- surprised it worked as well as it did with simple prompts. "Probably we're overcomplicating stuff". Yeah, probably.

- weird copyright / IP questions all around. This will be a minefield.

- Lots of SaaS products are screwed. Not from this, but from this + 10 engineers in every midsized company. NIH is now justified.

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1. dhorthy ◴[24 Aug 25 16:38 UTC] No.45005629[source]▶
Yeah the NIH thing is super on point. small saas tools for everything is done. Bring on the hand coded custom in-house admin monolith?

Is Unix “small sharp tools” going away? Is that a relic of having to write everything in x86 and we’re now just finally hitting the end of the arc?

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2. hyperadvanced ◴[25 Aug 25 01:48 UTC] No.45009453[source]▶
No the actual thing will be zillions of little apps made by dev-adjacent folks to automate their tasks. I think we have about 30 of these lying around the office, people gpt up a streamline app, we yeet it into prod.
3. ehnto ◴[25 Aug 25 05:59 UTC] No.45010682[source]▶
I am excited by the idea that small businesses with super unique problems may now be able to leverage custom software.

I have long held that high software salaries withhold the power of boutique software from its potential applications in small businesses.

It's possible we're about to see what unleashing software in small businesses might have looked like, to some degree, just with much less expert guidance and wisdom.

I am a developer so my point of view on salaries is not out of bitterness.