The use of AI tools needs to be balanced with the long-term viability of the profession and the growth of junior engineers. Experts suggest that businesses should have a proper knowledge strategy, including training in-house AI on their own practices and standards. They also emphasize the need for developers to understand the expectations, performance requirements, and underlying architectural and operational requirements of the code. The risk lies in losing the connection to the complex systems underpinning the tasks if the basic elements of the job are offloaded to AI.
Key takeaways:
- AI tools like GitHub Copilot and OpenAI’s ChatGPT are changing the software development landscape, but there are concerns that they could erode the foundations of the craft.
- The paradox of automation suggests that an overreliance on automation makes the human role more critical, as they need to know when to intervene if something goes wrong.
- There is a growing concern about the impact of AI on junior engineer growth, as AI takes on routine tasks and potentially creates a knowledge gap in the industry.
- Managing the paradox of automation will depend on how developers are trained, both in formal education and the workplace, to not just write code, but interrogate it.