Special shoutout to @georgekobaidze, who kindly shared my last post and asked the infamous question behind “Never leave Copilot unattended (ask me...
For further actions, you may consider blocking this person and/or reporting abuse
This is incredibly detailed and well-written. Thanks for sharing!
I can’t help but share it, just like the previous one, as it could genuinely save so many developers from disaster, all thanks to you.
I haven’t had a horror story like this with AI (yet), but honestly, I’m a little jealous what a powerful lesson to carry forward.
And you had me laughing out loud more than once your writing style is absolutely brilliant. 😂
Thank you! It cracks me up every time I think about it (now)! I literally interrupted a meeting earlier this week presented by the boss's boss because somebody was trying to make a point about Copilot touching code that it hadn't been prompted to. Not at all appropriate, but it just couldn't be helped 🤣 All the while I'm repeating in my head, "please, don't ask me what's so funny about that..."
I have a plan: I want to throw myself into that rabbit hole and build something without me getting involved too much. Sure, it'll be a personal, fun project, but still, I need that uncertainty and excitement of watching something possibly break and then scrambling to fix it.😂
Not that I haven't tried it (I've run into similar issues, but not that critical) or don't experience it daily, but that will be a whole different experience.
I don't know when I'll do it or what I'll build, but I'm going to document every step and turn it into a blog series.
Wish me luck! I'll need it. 😄
I'm sure you've got this! Whatever "this" turns out to be - it gets easier as you go, for sure, but every now and then something completely unexpected happens that makes the whole thing worthwhile! It's the most fun I've had on a hack project in a long time, lol. Good luck with the rabbits! and lmk how it goes 🐇
It seems that people spend more time telling ai what to do and fixing what it done than coding would take.
I think there's potential for that, sure. I'll even catch myself doing it at times, but that's true with anything, not just AI. I'm a strong believer in time-boxing just about every story, whether it's a new feature, production support or somewhere in between.
You have to take the situation into account, too. This one is just a fun story on a project that only involves work because I intentionally set it up that way. Would I allow that to happen on any project that actually had a timeline or even real users? Not a chance!
In practice, sometimes it 100% means closing the chat and diving into the code. You can follow all the best practices under the sun and still not get an answer that's remotely correct, in some cases. And, as you point out, it can be a huge time vortex if you're not careful.
You may enjoy the opposite side of the spectrum in next weeks post, too. I'm curious what your take will be, but I don't want to spoil the surprise. 🤫 Check in then and share your thoughts, if you can.
I'm all for the fun stories ;)
But seriously speaking, the thing that bothers me with allowing AI do the code is not being confident that code is 100% correct.
When one writes code himself, he knows all the code, all the anti hacking measures (for web apps) and all the things that should prevent breaking a production.
Also when one writes the code and something breaks, its easy to have an idea where it can be fixed.
When AI code breaks, one probably doesn't.
I'm not against AI. The thing is that I use it only to search for things I already know.
Totally agree - there’s always a balance! I wouldn’t hand the keys over to AI, but honestly, debugging human or AI mistakes can be equally baffling. For me, it’s all about boosting productivity without giving up that level of ownership or understanding of my code. 😁
man, I love how brutally honest this is. i’ve done way too many late night experiments that turned into cleanup duty. honestly makes me wonder how much trust we should put in these agents going forward you ever think we’ll get to a point where you can fully walk away and never worry about it backfiring
Thank you 😄 - that means a lot!
I think given the right circumstances, they can 100% do it now! Take Coding Agent for example (not to be confused with Agent Mode in the IDE): GitHub Copilot + Claude Sonnet + isolated branch + sandboxed VM + single task. It's beautiful (now that I can actually access it)! If you're wanting to set up something like I did safely, that's the way you do it!
I'm really glad you brought up the subject of trust, though. I just starting the first part of this upcoming week's post and will touch on the subject then (among other things). Stay tuned!
Really like it
Thank you - that means a lot! This story is officially on my wall of fame - right next to the infamous 3 AM incident response call (which, for the record, I only happened upon because I forgot to change the light bulb and stubbed my toe in the dark). 🤣
Loved the storytelling...
Thank you! Glad you enjoyed it 🥰