My first thought after reading this was, good for this person to have only been broken, or nearly broken, I guess, by society finally now.
I was broken long before AI. I learned that no one was interested in my doodads even before generative AI. People were interested in all this other stuff, like ROI, how much money things make, how practical something is, etc. "No one cares about the code" was beat into me 10-20 years ago. Big ups to Joel for making it this far.
Hah, I think I agree with this, but from a cynical, dark perspective.
I'm an old systems programmer (embedded, c/c++, linux, etc) with an EE background (but not one of them if you know what I mean. I enjoyed software and appreciate the art). But early on I came to believe software engineering at a workplace is not your personal art project. If you want that, great, go write code on your own time(as many of us do!). But on the job I often get annoyed by folks who don't want to do the obviously correct thing, or want to fight against good refactoring or design feedback (usually not from me.. I'm like a 'B' tier programmer and in awe of the 'A' level I work with). People treat software as an art and while you want to be artful in execution, if you are a paid artist, it is a commission work. Honor the requirements of the company (business needs) and not just your personal feelings and desire to only make art.
> I came to believe software engineering at a workplace is not your personal art project.
The minute I also realized this, I moved out of software development into a different function. Pooping out lines of ugly code full of compromises was just not my thing. If I was still coding for work when AI came around, that would have definitely pushed me out of the career.
So what's your function now?
I dabbled in product management and then went over to project management. I figure at least here, making compromises and negotiating with people is a specific requirement of the job, and not a shortcut to being able to produce Moar Output Faster.
Yeah I agree but I think the question these days isn't about the workplace anymore, it's about the meaning and value of human endeavor.
This is partially why my pride in my work is not around my code, but the product or output it creates. People care that the interfaces are good, the code style matches, and that it's maintainable. But they don't really care if it's clever or smart or creative. To me, the creativity is in the product, the tool, in what the code does. AI lets me be more creative in the tools I build because I can justify taking the time to build them. I can create more interesting products because I can get past the mundane.