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Programming with AI :D

Nimos

Well-Known Member
So I haven't programmed for a long time but decided to get back into it and therefore started creating a program. I have a good understanding of how to read code and how to approach it, but the syntax and stuff like that are causing me some issues. I'm using VB.net because I have always liked VB for some reason, as it was the first language I taught myself when I was little. But later on, moved to C++/C# as part of my education. But for some reason never worked with it as I wanted to do other stuff, but have programmed a lot in visual programming programs using the same principles, but ran into limitations.

Anyway, given the hype about AI and my newfound love for it, I decided to see if it could help me and I'm really impressed. :D

Here is just an example, that is really cool:
AI_Coding.jpg


I have seen other AIs that can help you code, but to me, this honestly seems a lot more helpful, even if it is just you needing examples of how to do something and not wanting to google around looking for answers. Is anyone else here that does programming also using it? because I'm going to use it a lot from now on to help me figure out the syntaxes etc. :D
 

kadzbiz

..........................
I bought some seeds. Planted them. Grew my own vegetables, which I cooked and ate, and then I planted more seeds from the plants I grew.
 

Brickjectivity

Veteran Member
Staff member
Premium Member
So I haven't programmed for a long time but decided to get back into it and therefore started creating a program. I have a good understanding of how to read code and how to approach it, but the syntax and stuff like that are causing me some issues. I'm using VB.net because I have always liked VB for some reason, as it was the first language I taught myself when I was little. But later on, moved to C++/C# as part of my education. But for some reason never worked with it as I wanted to do other stuff, but have programmed a lot in visual programming programs using the same principles, but ran into limitations.

Anyway, given the hype about AI and my newfound love for it, I decided to see if it could help me and I'm really impressed. :D

Here is just an example, that is really cool:
View attachment 75348

I have seen other AIs that can help you code, but to me, this honestly seems a lot more helpful, even if it is just you needing examples of how to do something and not wanting to google around looking for answers. Is anyone else here that does programming also using it? because I'm going to use it a lot from now on to help me figure out the syntaxes etc. :D
I haven't used it for programming, but I have a few credits left to spend. Maybe I'll try it sometime.

I am interested in: Python3, Rust, C98, maybe Forth, maybe C++ 11 or later; but I am too busy and distracted to mess with them right now. I taught myself Python3, already and also C. I've only coded in them for less than 100 hours though; so I am not a good programmer. I'm interested in Forth, because I checked out a book on it in 1988. I have also written some Pascal and Cobol (blech!), some Visual Basic for Office..for Excel.

I'm a decent bash user and write loops for that all the time, but I am not interested in mastering bash. It has too many gotchas and surprises. With bash its like...oops I shouldn't have put whitespace there! and the error message will be something incomprehensible. Plus the redirects don't make left-to-right sense at all. Its like someone wanted them to be cryptic.

Powershell. OMG. That was born out of the "Everything should be an object" era. I have never encountered more impenetrable code. I'm a functional programmer. Even in Python I'm heavily functional. Its just easier to understand.
 
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Nimos

Well-Known Member
I haven't used it for programming, but I have a few credits left to spend. Maybe I'll try it sometime.

I am interested in: Python3, Rust, C98, maybe Forth, maybe C++ 11 or later; but I am too busy and distracted to mess with them right now. I taught myself Python3, already and also C. I've only coded in them for less than 100 hours though; so I am not a good programmer. I'm interested in Forth, because I checked out a book on it in 1988. I have also written some Pascal and Cobol (blech!), some Visual Basic for Office..for Excel.

I'm a decent bash user and write loops for that all the time, but I am not interested in mastering bash. It has too many gotchas and surprises. With bash its like...oops I shouldn't have put whitespace there! and the error message will be something incomprehensible. Plus the redirects don't make left-to-right sense at all. Its like someone wanted them to be cryptic.

Powershell. OMG. That was born out of the "Everything should be an object" era. I have never encountered more impenetrable code. I'm a functional programmer. Even in Python I'm heavily functional. Its just easier to understand.
I'm just using the free version of Chatgpt and it's working fine, I gave it a good test today with stuff for my actual program and it works extremely well. As you, I don't consider myself a good programmer simply because I haven't spent all that much time on it, but making use of the AI, its basically like having an extremely skilled employee or tireless teacher next to you ready to answer all your questions with examples of exactly what you need, whereas when you google stuff, you often have to pick stuff from various examples and try to fit it together, or the code might not be explained especially well.

I am from the object era, but like you, I'm a huge function fan. But do see the benefit of using objects :D

You can get Visual Studio which is free and have a lot of error-correcting features built into it and also a sort of AI built-in in the form of Intellisense which will suggest code etc. Things have changed a lot for the better from when I studied computer science that is for sure. :)
It also supports C++, C#, VB, python and Java and some others. Luckily most of the language follows the same basic ideas of how to do things and mostly seems to come down to syntaxes being written slightly differently, so you can use C# examples for most VB as well etc, with just minor changes.

If you are interested in getting back into programming again, I found some very good tutorials for VB.net which are explained very well and are quick to go through. And it starts from "hello" world and all the way up to object-oriented programing etc. and given you already have a good understanding of how to code you can rush through them very fast.

Beginning course - 21 videos

intermediate course - 9 videos

Object-oriented programming - 10 videos

In regards to the AI, I do have an idea I want to try out when I'm done with my current program, which is to see if it is possible to make a program purely using AI, think that could be a fun experiment. :D

Despite my limited understanding of coding, there is no doubt in my mind that AI is going to be highly integrated into the future of computer science as a tool for programmers and my guess is that those that do not manage to integrate it into their workflow are going to lose out big. Even if one is good at programming, simply getting the AI to code the more basic stuff, will greatly increase the speed by which one can code simply by copy/pasting stuff. It is going to be very interesting to see how it will affect things in the next few years, but my guess is that it will be extreme, to be honest :D
 
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Debater Slayer

Vipassana
Staff member
Premium Member
So I haven't programmed for a long time but decided to get back into it and therefore started creating a program. I have a good understanding of how to read code and how to approach it, but the syntax and stuff like that are causing me some issues. I'm using VB.net because I have always liked VB for some reason, as it was the first language I taught myself when I was little. But later on, moved to C++/C# as part of my education. But for some reason never worked with it as I wanted to do other stuff, but have programmed a lot in visual programming programs using the same principles, but ran into limitations.

Anyway, given the hype about AI and my newfound love for it, I decided to see if it could help me and I'm really impressed. :D

Here is just an example, that is really cool:
View attachment 75348

I have seen other AIs that can help you code, but to me, this honestly seems a lot more helpful, even if it is just you needing examples of how to do something and not wanting to google around looking for answers. Is anyone else here that does programming also using it? because I'm going to use it a lot from now on to help me figure out the syntaxes etc. :D

I have my degree in computer science, so I know quite a few people who work in the field. From what I have seen and been told, ChatGPT is okay for some basic code and even some scripts, which are very handy to automate because they're highly tedious to keep manually writing every time someone needs them.

However, for whole programs or more complex functions (e.g., tools for automotive design), it still can't consistently produce reliable, efficient code. It's a good tool to help programmers, but a lot of aspects of software development—especially interaction-based ones such as communication with clients to identify requirements and features—still require a human at the helm. This is also true for debugging and optimization. A human has to review everything the AI does to ensure the code isn't inefficient or bug-laden.
 

Nimos

Well-Known Member
I have my degree in computer science, so I know quite a few people who work in the field. From what I have seen and been told, ChatGPT is okay for some basic code and even some scripts, which are very handy to automate because they're highly tedious to keep manually writing every time someone needs them.

However, for whole programs or more complex functions (e.g., tools for automotive design), it still can't consistently produce reliable, efficient code. It's a good tool to help programmers, but a lot of aspects of software development—especially interaction-based ones such as communication with clients to identify requirements and features—still require a human at the helm. This is also true for debugging and optimization. A human has to review everything the AI does to ensure the code isn't inefficient or bug-laden.
Agree, I don't think the current AI can replace humans, might be possible in 10+ years depending on where things go and given that 10 years within computer science is a really long time :D

The way I look at it is like when the first computers hit the market and despite them being extremely impressive at the time, they are nothing compared to what we have today the technology exploded in very few years and still is.

We are only in the extremely early ages of AI and honestly, I don't think anyone has any clue how it is going to impact our societies because they are dealing with areas that technology has never dealt with before. If we look at the past invention of technologies, like the computer or farming equipment etc. these have obviously had a huge impact on humans, but they have always had humans at the helm in a more direct way much like a hammer or saw etc. Whereas AI is dealing with a completely different area, because if you have an AI that is capable of passing a university degree, let's say in a few years they can pass them with an A+ grade, would you trust the AI more than a human which might have gotten a C? Also, the AI in theory at least should serve your best interest, whereas you might risk getting screwed over by a human because we have the ability to cheat and do fraud etc.

It is definitely a question that is going to rise at some point I think, whether we want to or not. Not that it is extremely new to us in the majority of things we do, because most of us rely on technologies to guide us through the day, from something as simple as an alarm clock or a watch to be on time etc. So is relying on AI's for other things which we are not used to any different? or are we just scared because they seem more "human" than a watch or an alarm clock does :D
 

Nimos

Well-Known Member
-----------------------
Testing programing with AI
-----------------------
So I couldn't help myself so decided to recreate the program im working on, but this time, rather than just using the AI to give examples, im trying to let it program 99% of it, only adding minor stuff my self, but is merely guiding it.

Will share my experiences here for those that find it interesting and will just share my interaction with it and the progress.

1. Defining the project
1.jpg

It pretty much nailed exactly what I wanted to do and how it should work. So that was a good start :D At this point it started going crazy and defining classes and adding variables, so had to tell it to stop. Because it have a tendency to change things between solutions, meaning that it will use different variable names and change how stuff works with no regards to how it suggested it earlier.

2. Making sure we work together
So in hope to solve that I created a tag system in the form of <Tag name> that refer to a part of the program which contains code.

3.jpg

So that is how I make sure that we are using the same code, so I tell it to update the tags with whatever code seems to work best :D
It does however still struggle a bit with it, but it is better than it just going crazy.

3. The process
4.jpg

So this is basically how I go about it, I tell it what I want it to do and it codes all of it. I then copy/paste that directly into .Net and check if it works as intended. :D

And so far so good, it is possible to create a new project and it creates the whole folder structure, XML file holding the required information.

It is a lot of fun and extremely impressive to be honest.

4.Final words
Once these AI's get more developed, I fear for the future of a lot of programmers to be honest, because everyone is going to be able to program applications without knowing anything about coding, at least that is my prediction. So even if it is not perfect at the moment, it is simply a matter of time before it knows everything about coding as I see it and how to not make errors.
 

HonestJoe

Well-Known Member
I have seen other AIs that can help you code, but to me, this honestly seems a lot more helpful, even if it is just you needing examples of how to do something and not wanting to google around looking for answers. Is anyone else here that does programming also using it? because I'm going to use it a lot from now on to help me figure out the syntaxes etc. :D
You really don't need AI to do that kind of thing. There are all sorts of helpers, tools and IDE functionality that can generate scaffold structures like that, often very complex ones these days.

Also, a key problem with AI is that it can be subject to all sorts of tiny and obscure errors (ironically, not unlike humans), so I'm not sure this is the best use of it for any real practical development. The general point of AI is to replicate human creativity and variation, which is exactly the opposite of what you want for basic coding structures.

It could be of use with the kind of planning and design stuff you went on to, but even then you need to be conscious that it doesn't understand anything it is saying so could easily give you something that is flawed or simply wrong, with exactly the same confidence it would give you a valid answer.

As far as replacing programmers, I don't see that as a major threat. AI is just another tool that certainly could be used to support and improve the process, but just like all the other tools (like the IDEs, rapid compilation, WYSIWYG interfaces etc.), which it could certainly change how things work, the skills people will need and the pace of development, I don't see it leading to massive changes in headcount.
 

Nimos

Well-Known Member
You really don't need AI to do that kind of thing. There are all sorts of helpers, tools and IDE functionality that can generate scaffold structures like that, often very complex ones these days.

Also, a key problem with AI is that it can be subject to all sorts of tiny and obscure errors (ironically, not unlike humans), so I'm not sure this is the best use of it for any real practical development. The general point of AI is to replicate human creativity and variation, which is exactly the opposite of what you want for basic coding structures.

It could be of use with the kind of planning and design stuff you went on to, but even then you need to be conscious that it doesn't understand anything it is saying so could easily give you something that is flawed or simply wrong, with exactly the same confidence it would give you a valid answer.

As far as replacing programmers, I don't see that as a major threat. AI is just another tool that certainly could be used to support and improve the process, but just like all the other tools (like the IDEs, rapid compilation, WYSIWYG interfaces etc.), which it could certainly change how things work, the skills people will need and the pace of development, I don't see it leading to massive changes in headcount.
Im doing it more for fun and as an experiment to see if it is possible. As it is now a lot of the stuff takes a lot longer because I do still have to check the code and tell it to make corrections.

Im not sure that I agree that the main idea of AI is to replicate human creativity because, to be honest, they seem to really suck at that. It takes some time to convince it to do anything even remotely creative.

I have had a discussion with it, having to "demonstrate" to it that it is as creative as many humans are. And also tried to make it draw some animals using ASCII art and they look nothing like the animal, to be honest. It obviously depends on what AI you are using, but even the ones that seem to focus on art, I'm pretty sure just borrow images from the internet and mix them together.

AI, as it is now, is not capable of replacing programmers, but let's say in 10 years? Then im not so certain.

Try this:

It allows you to build a website in 30 seconds and sure you still have to change the content with text etc. But honestly, it is a decent-looking website that will work well for a huge amount of people or small businesses without having to hire a company to do it.

Sure AI is not perfect at the moment, but the first mobile phones sucked *** as well and now everyone has one and they are faster and smaller than ever, with cameras, video recording etc.

As I see it an AI thrives in computer languages where there are well-defined rules for how to do things and not to do them, It's kind of like math in that sense. You either follow the rules to get the correct result or you don't and it is wrong.

Where humans are needed as I see it, is to come up with ideas of what needs to be done and what problems need to be solved, as the AI might not see them as issues.
 

HonestJoe

Well-Known Member
Im not sure that I agree that the main idea of AI is to replicate human creativity because, to be honest, they seem to really suck at that. It takes some time to convince it to do anything even remotely creative.
Maybe "replicate" was the wrong word, more "imitate". After all, anything an AI produces is creation and so appears creative. Not being very good (in your opinion) doesn't change that - there is plenty of human creativity many people think is rubbish too.

The ASCII art thing is a special case, but really shows how AI is more limited on technical detail than creative imitation. A text-based AI trained to produce natural language is obviously going to struggle with ASCII art because it can't perceive the shapes in the same way we can. If an AI was specifically trained on ASCII art, I've no doubt it'd be able to create it's own versions, just as it does with digital art or photographs.

AI, as it is now, is not capable of replacing programmers, but let's say in 10 years? Then im not so certain.
I expect that in 10 years there'll be more programmers because a whole load will be working in AI. :cool:

It allows you to build a website in 30 seconds and sure you still have to change the content with text etc. But honestly, it is a decent-looking website that will work well for a huge amount of people or small businesses without having to hire a company to do it.
I'm pretty sure the text is the only thing the AI is actually generating, and as you say, that's the part that needs a human to fix. The rest is just a choice of templates and layouts. Again, you don't need AI to do that and there are plenty of conventional services which do that automatically already. This is just using the current in-term to get money from the naive. Six months ago they were probably selling NFTs.

Sure AI is not perfect at the moment, but the first mobile phones sucked *** as well and now everyone has one and they are faster and smaller than ever, with cameras, video recording etc.
Yes, but they've also not completely replaced land-lines or cameras and they've not really replaced previous activity. People make more calls, send more messages, take more pictures and videos than they did in the past, just with a wider range of tools.

As I see it an AI thrives in computer languages where there are well-defined rules for how to do things and not to do them, It's kind of like math in that sense. You either follow the rules to get the correct result or you don't and it is wrong.
No, computers thrive in that context, which is why programming languages were developed that way in the first place. The whole point of AI is to go beyond that limitation, not just than operate within it.

Where humans are needed as I see it, is to come up with ideas of what needs to be done and what problems need to be solved, as the AI might not see them as issues.
Well, most Project Managers could probably be replaced with AI but then most Project Managers could be replaced by brick wall with a calendar hung on it. I'm pretty sure we'll still need people to do the actual work. ;)
 

Nimos

Well-Known Member
Not being very good (in your opinion) doesn't change that - there is plenty of human creativity many people think is rubbish too.
Don't misunderstand what I meant, as I said it depends on the AI, I was referring to ChatGPT and should probably have specified that, but then again it is a language AI, but it seems to have changed a lot since I tried the last time.

Because last time it took me a while to get it to make up a story, but now it is no issues at all:
Poem.jpg

I'm not into poems, so whether it's beautiful or not I have no clue :D but I have to admit that I couldn't do that, and not at the speed it can do it.

Also, this was some AI art I created with another AI, where you can type some keywords and then it generates something based on that.

1.jpg


But these AIs keep impressing me, so I actually agree with you. :)

I expect that in 10 years there'll be more programmers because a whole load will be working in AI. :cool:
You might be right. But I tried to interact with it a bit more about the project to test it a little, so I wanted to see how it would solve an issue. And this is how it went:

6.jpg

7.jpg

The mere fact, that it even understands the idea behind the project and can come up with suggestions, to me is mind-blowing. What it is saying makes perfect sense in regard to what the project is about and how "we" have developed it, because we talked about XML earlier.

I'm pretty sure the text is the only thing the AI is actually generating, and as you say, that's the part that needs a human to fix. The rest is just a choice of templates and layouts. Again, you don't need AI to do that and there are plenty of conventional services which do that automatically already. This is just using the current in-term to get money from the naive. Six months ago they were probably selling NFTs.
My guess is that working as a web designer today with so many sites that can create websites for you, including shops etc. that it is not a particularly good area to work in, compared to for instance 15-20 years ago, when this wasn't possible.

So to think that it won't also affect other programmers I think is to be a bit naive.

Yes, but they've also not completely replaced land-lines or cameras and they've not really replaced previous activity. People make more calls, send more messages, take more pictures and videos than they did in the past, just with a wider range of tools.
But it is close, not in regards to cameras, but I think a lot of this comes from the fact that there is a limit to how small you can make them if you want them to be good, with lenses etc. Phones need to be small. But landlines are almost dead, at least in Denmark, I don't know a single person that has one.

No, computers thrive in that context, which is why programming languages were developed that way in the first place. The whole point of AI is to go beyond that limitation, not just than operate within it.
Yes, but AI thrives here as well because it can keep track of all the data, rules, methods etc. Obviously, they need learning, but no human can do that as fast as they can. And computer programs in theory just huge amounts of data and how to manipulate them.

Well, most Project Managers could probably be replaced with AI but then most Project Managers could be replaced by brick wall with a calendar hung on it. I'm pretty sure we'll still need people to do the actual work. ;)
Well agree with that :D

But a huge issue is as with the photograph above, that those that gave him a prize didn't know it was an AI, yet he won. It took me less than 5 seconds to make it write that poem. It doesn't take a lot of imagination to figure out that one could make it write 400 poems and then you select the ones you think is best, put them in a book and publish them, I'm not sure people would be able to tell the difference. But for people writing poems, this might not be the best news. And my guess is that they get better and better, again if one can already win a photo contest or what it was, then it is clearly good enough or at least better than a lot of humans. So rather than hire a professional photographer just get the AI to create 100 photos and choose the one you like the most. If the only thing that makes someone like something is because a given human made it, then one could argue that the art itself is probably not that important anyway. Obviously, there is something about having an original, but for most artists, this is not relevant, it is the fewest people which will reach that status.

These AI's are going to have a massive impact on society in places where people couldn't imagine it I think.
 
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