Post by @rocketsoup@mastodon.social

2026-10-28 12:36 UTC

Yesterday I used Claude to implement a whole feature at work out of necessity. It was in UI code I was unfamiliar with in languages I don’t know. I wanna say it did a terrible job, but it didn’t. I spent a couple hours looking over it to understand what I was putting my name on and it was very well done. Handled edge cases and details I wouldn’t have thought of. Struggling with how to feel about it. It was very helpful, and I wish it didn’t exist.

Replies (1)

@tyrthecat@social.treehouse.systems 2026-10-28 16:07

@rocketsoup@mastodon.social obviously hard to say without seeing the code but I noticed at my workplace a lot of this code seems well written but actually isn't: Incorrect/incomplete use of ecosystem features: lots of code is written simply because a more effective feature that should be used is not.Impossible cases managed: even more code is written (and code flow paths created) to handle errors that can't be seen in a particular context. Sadly both require deep knowledge of the surrounding parts/frameworks to know about. But I trust you to say the code is well written and I'd like to respond with: so what? My personal take is the harm is too great and overall not worth the results, even if they are good results. This of course is fine in principle and can't always be applied (people need jobs, etc ...). But I think it is important to remember it as well. Part of me would like to equate this to a toxic/abusive coworker: they do good work but we would accept this. Until I remember that yeah, most companies are totally fine with very toxic employees as long as they are "good".

Open ##5299169