I don’t know. But, whatever it’s, it’s fun.
I should start by saying that I’m not a software engineer.
I’m a guy who studied to be a software engineer for three years before saying, “Fuck it–I’m going to study literature. (Because that’s where the jobs are!)”
I eventually became a teacher, but I’ve done coding projects for fun since the days of the Apple 2E.
The first game I ever coded was on a floppy disc. In Basic. It used a goddamned joystick.
I know a variety of programming languages (started in C, mostly used PHP) and I’ve used multiple different IDEs. Ask me if I could build you an app, and I’d firmly tell you, “No,” but I’d tell you what software you could probably use if you wanted to do it yourself.
I’ve never done software development professionally in any capacity. I only ever do one thing, over and over. I think, “Oh, hey, wouldn’t it be cool if [IDEA] existed?” And then sort of half-assedly work on that project for a few years in my spare time before, invariably, switching to a different project and leaving [IDEA] on a shelf.
I would call myself a “persistent amateur,” but I’m not actually that persistent.
But, holy shit, these AI tools that help you code are goddamned astounding.
I’ve been trying out Codex and Claude Code quite a bit over the past few weeks, and I am floored by everything they can do.
When I decided to test their capabilities — or, more accurately, to test how I would utilize those capabilities (are there any sorts of standards for AI-assisted coding? What are the best practices? What the hell are they teaching in college now?) — I downloaded an IDE called Godot and created a new project.
Then, I had Claude create the base game files for a tile-based puzzle game.
It build the whole architecture in a few minutes. All that annoying set-up work you normally expect, all those settings you have to look up. Just done. *Snap.* Like fuckin’ Thanos.
I’ve been asking myself…is this what “vibe coding” is?
What’s the difference between “vibe coding” and “AI-assisted coding?”
Because it seems like people disparage vibe coding. Which I understand. The term “vibe coding” conjures in my mind an image of a teenager sitting on his couch somewhere telling his iPad, “ChahBBT build me an app that will make me a million dollars and also does this mole look like Ryan Gosling.”
But, at the same time, you would be nuts not to use AI tools. Even professionals must be using them. And rampantly.
They save so much time.
I was like, “Can you set up Git repositories,” and Claude was like, “Oh, yeah, I did already.”
What.
Fuckin’.
What?