> "in isolation this code makes a lot of sense"..."what is this junk"

I mean I am left with two thoughts:

1. programming language skill issue. Some languages are simply much better at composition than others. I find that yes, this happens, but actually on the order of a day, and once the code is "good", it doesn't really change that much in the grand scheme of things?

2. Even for languages where composition is better, this is exactly what happens with human development too?

▲

catlifeonmars 3 hours ago | parent [-]

2. tends to happen less with more experienced engineers

I think the mistake is assuming you get high quality work with an agent regardless of the driver’s skill level. That doesn’t appear to be the case, but it’s the value prop that is being sold.

▲

dnautics 3 hours ago | parent [-]

2 is true even for highly experienced engineers over the long horizon, you keep building and then you realize that there's a better pattern that you should refactor a bunch of stuff for, but it gets tabled because feature XYZ is more important, and then feature YZW, etc. and then one day you're faced with looking down the abyss of committing to a refactor while some JE wants to rewrite everything in rust.

	▲	catlifeonmars an hour ago \| parent [-]
		And then you realize that most stuff is not worth refactoring if you can’t finish it in one go… it’s like a dunning Krueger roller coaster.