Two Steps Back / Three Angles of Attack
So much of success at work as a dev, lies more in having AI solve problems for you and less in having you solving problems with AI.
I met a friend today - new hire to a company, having a hard time with setting up his machine. And in discussing how to resolve it - it helped clarify how I use AI to solve problems.
There are three things that need to be done, in parallel, all at the same time.
First, is to attempt to directly solve the problem. Ask AI, go do this. Install this thing. Set this up. Build this thing. Fix this error.
This is the direct route. It usually works. Its critical. The other routes two don't replace it, only support it.
Second, step back, and ask AI to solve the problem more holistically. For setup, ask, what are 10 things that can make my setup more reliable. I am having issues with setup, what are 10 things I can try. You’re looking for the AI to help you make setup (as an example) better by having more logging, review dependencies closer, be more robust, error out earlier, validate inputs and outputs, validate certs and credentials, etc. Here, it wont directly solve the problem, but it sets up the environment for your to be successful. I’ve done this with logging, instrumentation, unit tests, making things configurable, etc. How far AI can go, in problem solving, will partly be dictated by how much support infrastructure it has, and you need to work on it in parallel.
Third, take another step back, and see, where is AI confused in all this, and manage the context. If you asking for setup help on windows machine, and its doing ls, something is up. If its assuming you have/dont have root and you dont/do, something is up. What are its assumptions, that are made clear to you, when it’s recommending these things. How wrong are they? And can you fix them.
It’s a lot more work, than say, brute forcing your way through. And its not natural. What’s natural is seeing the next error message, and trying to make it go away. But without taking two steps back, it’s easy to get stuck. And without taking two steps back, your system won’t be set up for success the next time around.
Decelerating for Acceleration,
Ibrahim