< I enjoy writing code. Let me get that out of the way first.

< I haven’t written a boilerplate handler by hand in months. I haven’t manually scaffolded a CLI in I don’t know how long. I don’t miss any of it.

Sounds like the author is confused or trying too hard to please the audience. I feel software engineering has higher expectation to move faster now, which makes it more difficult as a discipline.

I personally code data structures and algorithms for 1 - 2 hrs a day, because I enjoy it. I find it also helps keeps me sharp and prevents me from building too much cognitive debt with AI generated code.

I find most AI generated code is over engineered and needs a thorough review before being deployed into production. I feel you still have to do some of it yourself to maintain an edge. Or at least I do at my skill level.

"I personally code data structures and algorithms for 1 - 2 hrs a day"

What does this mean? You do leet code problems a few hours a day? Or go through a text book? Genuinely curious.