> especially with AI

Yeah, the middle path sounds promising.

"Code Mode", where the AI writes a little program or script to do the AST/symbol transformations sounds like the win. As you point out, less tokens, and gives the humans insight.

This isn't exactly the same application of a "code mode" as before, but in my view it's a broad philosophy. AI for building machines, instead of doing the work directly. It also allows for easier updates/retries too. https://blog.cloudflare.com/code-mode/ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45399204 https://blog.cloudflare.com/code-mode-mcp/ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47089505