I also find OpenCode to be drastically better than Claude Code, to the extent that I'm buying OpenRouter API credits rather than Claude Max because Claude Code just isn't good enough.

I'm frankly amazed at what OpenCode can do with a few custom commands (just for common things like doing a quality review, etc.), and maybe an extra "agent" definition or two. For many projects even most of this isn't necessary. Often I just ask it to write an AGENTS.md that encapsulates a good development workflow, git branch/commit policy, testing and quality standards, and ROADMAP.md plus per milestone markdown files with phases and task tracking, and this is enough.

I'm somewhat interested in these more involved harnesses that automated or enforce more, but I don't know that they'd give me much that I don't have and I think they'd be tough to keep up with the state of the art compared to something less specific.

Claude Code is strictly worse than e.g. OpenCode in my experience. Not much to see in the app’s code except how it authenticates itself…

Sure I try and use all my subscription allowance with CC on side tasks, etc. but I still end up burning a bunch of API tokens (via OpenRouter) for more serious work (even the UI and ability to quickly review what the agent has done/is doing is vastly inferior in CC).

What they have done is got me experimenting with cheaper models from other providers with those API credits.

I'm happy for the Astral team but in my opinion, big tech especially is incompatible with curiosity and hacker ethos.

Once I can describe something well, that’s most of the interesting part (to me) done.

Actually typing code is pretty dull. To the extent that I rarely do it full time (basically only when prototyping or making very simple scripts etc.), even though I love making things.

So for me, personally, LLMs are great. I'm making more software (and hardware) than ever, mostly just to scratch an itch.

Those people that really love it should be fine. Hobbies aren't supposed to make you money anyway.

I don't have much interest in maintaining the existence of software development/engineering (or anything else) as a profession if it turns out it's not necessary. Not that I think that's really what's happening. Software engineering will continue as a profession. Many developers have been doing barely useful glue work (often as a result of bad/overcomplicated abstractions and tooling in the first place, IMO) and perhaps that won't be needed, but plenty more engineers will continue to design and build things just more effectively and with better tools.

We have reached a point of complexity and short-termism where it's standard practice to shove a huge, barely tested mass of Python, JavaScript, shell scripts, and who knows what else inside a docker container and call it done. Complete with hundreds or thousands of intractable dependencies, many of which we know ~nothing about and thousands of lines of esoteric configurations for servers we have barely any hope of even getting to run optimally, let alone securely.

Most software has been awful for a while.

Already, with AI:

- We can build everything in a statically typed, analysable, and memory safe language like Rust[0], even bits that really have to interact with the shell or wider OS and would previously have been shell scripts

- We can insist on positively deranged amounts of testing, at every level

- We can easily cut the number of dependencies in our code by >50%, in many cases more like 90%

- We can do the refactor as soon as it becomes obvious that it would be a good idea

- We can implement quality of life admin and monitoring features that would otherwise sit on the backlog for eternity

- We can educate ourselves about what we've built[1] by asking questions about our codebase, build tools to understand the behaviour of our systems, etc.

So yes, I agree that "The Future Belongs to Whoever Understands What They Shipped", but unlike the author I am somewhat optimistic[2]. There is more opportunity than ever to build and understand extremely high quality software that does not accept technical debt, corner cutting to meet deadlines, or poor quality (in design or implementation), for those that engineers who are knowledgeable enough and willing to embrace the new tools.

And AI, and the tooling around it, is only getting better.

[0] or Go or even TypeScript, but there's precious little reason not to pick Rust for most use cases now

[1] of course we need to choose to, and many won't…

[2] of course, there'll also be near-infinite valueless slop and some people will get sucked into that, but this seems little different to regurgitated SEO spam, short form video, and all the non-AI enshittification we already put up with, and perhaps AI will help more of us do a better job of avoiding it

It'd be more than just a bit inconvenient to lose all of these things…

Luckily, all of my personal and business banking apps work fine on Graphene. Even the apps for the crusty old "bricks and mortar" banks that I still have backup accounts with.

[0] As an aside, Revolut Ultra in the UK costs less than the FT Digital subscription it includes so if you're an FT subscriber, all the other stuff that comes with the account is cheaper than free.

I hope not

Better for it to grow layers that are new and exciting, accessible only to the cultures that create them (and whatever comes after) and those who make the effort to continue learning

Citation needed…

Seriously, the number of very senior people I’ve come across who will happily share their login details (which are clearly the same everywhere) with almost anyone to avoid having to read a three paragraph email should put to rest any privacy or security related argument that starts with “you wouldn’t…”

a) much more time and effort should be focused on catching and stopping the most persistent repeat offenders (sometimes by locking them up); and

b) orders of magnitude too many Americans are currently in prison.

The biggest issue I have with it is macOS Tahoe. Guess I really should be checking out Asahi on it!

Most people in most situations pay as little as they can get away with not as much as they value the product or service.

The only time this is arguably somewhat untrue is when the point of having the thing is to signal wealth, but even someone buying e.g. a Rolex wants to do so as cheaply as possible, so it's only really true when they're directly spending the money in front of people (think bar, restaurant, nightclub, etc.)

I agree that right now it's mostly developer tools that are doing best in terms of open source. But browsers, operating systems, 3D modelling software, image/photo editing, and many others are not so far behind either.

My assertion/belief[0], though, is that the direction of travel is for open source to become dominant in more and more classes of software, especially as AI reduces the cost of contribution and collaboration, and disincentivises closed, proprietary software.

[0] Based on what I and others around me have been able to do with AI already and how fast it is moving.