jacobian2d ago

Look this isn’t at all a defense of slop code, but it has me thinking — how much does code quality matter, and why?

It’s maintenance, right? We care about readability because we know we’ll have to make changes, fix bugs, etc.

But so … imagine a codebase that’s magically bug-free and feature-complete. (I’m aware this is a strawman - that’s the point, it’s a thought experiment.) Does it matter if this codebase is well-written? I’m not sure it does! (1/5)

Show threadjacobian2d ago
Code quality has always been ONE factor; it’s never been always the most important. Eg we often accept complex internals as the price for a clean external API; and we all write sloppy code for one-offs, prototypes, etc. So part of me accepts the “code quality doesn’t matter” argument. I can see a vision of agentic engineering with systems that prove correctness; if an agent produces code that is provably correct, maybe the quality really doesn’t matter! (2/5)
Show threadjacobian2d ago
I’m far from convinced that this is actually possible. It’s certainly not now — and I’m not talking about models. Testing and verification tools are nowhere near where they’d need to be, regardless of model quality. Today, code quality DOES still matter; even the best-case version of agentic engineering can’t produce code that’ll never require maintenance. But I can see a possible future where code quality might not matter, or will matter a lot less, and that’s FASCINATING. (3/5)
Show threadSean Coates

@jacob A thought when reading this: even if it were possible to make something perfect (serving your straw man) by today's version of perfect, we know that definition will change over time (e.g. https everywhere today, but not before Firesheep).

I think there are some parallels here to “I'm not doing anything wrong, so privacy doesn't matter to me.” The definition of “not doing anything wrong" has changed.

Also difficult maintenance via LLM will get *expensive* when it's unsubsidized.

Apr 2 at 2:50pmWeb
Show threadjacobian2d ago
@sean Ahh yes! “Done” and “correct” are slippery, I was thinking that, but the idea of their definition changing over time totally matches my experience and is a pretty great way of bringing the strawman back to earth.