DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 09/10/2026"I have the knowledge necessary to steer it very precisely." And it still results in code that's less precise than those who write the code themselves. "It writes better code than I do." The junior to senior pipeline doesn't exist for generators, but it exists for you; you can grow, it can't. 000
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 09/10/2026"It allows me to apply my programming knowledge to other languages." 1) This isn't exclusive to generators: it's called "having programming fundamentals", and it applies to all languages. 2) If you're not competent in a language (i.e., you must generate code), you can't verify code in it. 100
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 09/10/2026"It allowed me to do it in weeks when it would've taken months." This isn't exclusive to generators: if you take the months to do it, then next time it will take weeks. This trick is called "reusing code you already wrote, tested, verified, and are familiar with". 110
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 08/10/2026"They're training it with better code now." Closed-source professionally-written code obtained without consent? "By filtering out amateur and generated code." Generated code that amateurs go to lengths to hide their generator usage? "They're bad at hiding it." We agree on that at least. 110
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 08/10/2026"The average programmer writes bad code too." This is often why better-than-average programmers are sought out. "If it writes bad code, it's because it was trained on bad code." Sounds like a good reason not to use it. "It's getting better all the time." While still trained on "average" "bad" code? 100
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 08/10/2026VS Code, I defined the "active tab background" color for a REASON, and you're just going to ignore it and have it be the editor background instead? Thankfully, you can switch to "pill" tabs and it respects the colors I specifically set for my theme. They really should just leave everything alone. 000
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 05/10/2026"This thing I do at work isn't fun, therefore it just must not be a fun thing to do at all." The version of it you do for work is the non-fun version. Let me introduce you to the community of people who do it on their own terms and have fun doing it. - Signed, makers everywhere. 000
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 03/10/2026"I use it for tests and documentation, but I hand-write everything else." Just what software needs: more programmers who can't write tests and can't write documentation, thinking it's better to skip it in the name of faster output. In other words, you REALLY should learn how to do both of those. 100
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 03/10/2026"The bigger danger is competent people using it." That's an oxymoron. If the generator does things you aren't (and don't wish to be) competent at, then competent people don't use the generator because it's an extra step that gets in the way. So, the danger, like always, is incompetent people, yes. 100
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 03/10/2026It really IS just like Bob Ross says: if you don't know where to start, throw literally anything on the canvas and see where it takes you. For BGM 4, it was several basslines until the percussion track (of all things) gave me an idea for a bassline I finally liked, and it went from there. 000
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 03/10/2026I have 3 BGMs so far, and I wanted to add a 4th, but I was having trouble getting it started, because my inspiration juice was empty or something. To solve this, all I had to do was doink around in OpenMPT (like I usually do to prototype chiptunes) until I got something I didn't hate. :P 100
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 29/09/2026It's been so long since I've written a proper essay that I'd completely forgotten that you're supposed to indent the first line of each paragraph. I did remember about having the lines be double-spaced, and that you need a "works cited" section. 000
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 28/09/2026"You reject generators, do you walk everywhere too?" The alternatives to "walking everywhere" often involve machines requiring licenses to operate, along with laws and insurance, so it's not the same. Though now that you mention it, a similar requirement for generator use may not be a bad idea. :P 100
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 28/09/2026"This guy who used it made more money than this indie who didn't." The guy who used it is better at marketing than programming, while the indie who's a better programmer may have been worse at marketing. There's 99 reasons one game makes more money than another, but generator use isn't one. 100
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 28/09/2026Those, neither hand nor manager, who tried to gain favor by swearing allegiance to the abomination found themselves drowned out by the warring manager classes within the corporation-sphere, and rejected also by the hands scorned by the abomination and its legion. Hands who reciprocated the scorn. 000
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 28/09/2026"Using this magic box, you dictate what you want, and it makes it for you, no expertise in anything required!" Management-types everywhere: "Finally, my day has come." After the workers were let go, the managers fought with each other and with the C-suite for supremacy. 100
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 27/09/2026Got sound effects now, and let me tell you, having music and sound effects in your demo makes a huge difference in how it feels to play. Also, for the first time ever, I had to consider a special SFX priority mode of "let the next key-on in the music interrupt this SFX". I finally needed it. :P 100
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 25/09/2026Working with a generated codebase is like working with the generated assembly code of a compiled C++ codebase (before we even talk about coherence). It's easier both to work with the original C++ source code the assembly code is compiled from, and to work with a hand-written assembly codebase. 100
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 25/09/2026(cont'd) I see a future where it means "largely generated codebase where the guts are so needlessly complicated from incompetence that nobody wants to touch it", and it would be RARE because I think those systems would collapse on themselves before they gain any momentum. :P 000
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 25/09/2026Someone brought up how there are still critical systems running on COBOL and a shrinking supply of programmers who can maintain them, and was afraid that this will apply to *everything* soon. I'm sure they meant "legacy human written/readable/maintainable codebase", but (cont'd on next page :) ) 100
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 25/09/2026Oh nevermind, I misunderstood you; the compo I'm talking about is the "Lofi mini-jam 2" on the NESDev forums. 130
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 24/09/2026I haven't shared anything yet; I'm just muttering to myself here while I work on it. :P 001
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 22/09/2026How exactly did we arrive at UP, DOWN, LEFT, RIGHT being the order the directions come in? 000
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 21/09/2026"It said it didn't copy anything when making this." As language prediction, it's designed to tell you literally anything you want it to; there's no way to guarantee correlation between its actions vs what it says. A: "I did it." B: "No you didn't." A: "You're right, it looks like I actually didn't." 100
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 21/09/2026"Training it is just like how humans learn." Not the same: I can make Super Mario World by observing what it looks and feels like to play, and using my expertise to guess at how it was implemented. The generator can make Super Mario World because it literally has its source code and can copy/paste. 100
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 21/09/2026I managed to implement a 6502 version of the platform-slope logic I did a JS prototype of a while back. The JS prototype is much more generic and handles many different situations I was able to simplify and eliminate in this game (e.g., nothing will be wider than 16 pixels here). 110
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 20/09/2026Oh my god, I absolutely live for that feeling you get in your gut when you immensely enjoy the part of the song you just wrote. For me, it was the loop point that did it for me, twice in a row. :P 000
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 18/09/2026It's 2026, and I'm checking in that I *still* enjoy occasionally booting up Wacky Worlds Creativity Studio and letting it sit on the world select screen for the endless variety of music. :D 000
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 18/09/2026At what time-of-day do you normally replace the batteries? Maybe it's time to try waiting +12 hours to see if that shifts the timing back to the daytime. :P (I'm mostly joking here, but it'd be really funny if it worked at least once for somebody. :P) 000
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 18/09/2026Agreed. I mostly look for bad comparisons or flawed logic when I read these arguments, because if you point those out, then it doesn't matter whether their argument is based on something real or a hypothetical. :P 011
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 18/09/2026"If I make all the assets, can I generate the game since I can't program?" No, there's plenty of game-making platforms which don't require programming; I grew up with The Games Factory and Multimedia Fusion. No programming, but teaches logic and flow; much better than just generating w/ no learning. 100
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 18/09/2026"Games aren't art, they're entertainment." "Generated" games are indeed entertainment with no considerable value, artistic or otherwise. For everyone else, games require several artforms (writing, visual, music, game design, implementation) to come together to make something anyone actually wants. 130
Reposted by DragWxTechnology Connections @techconnectify.bsky.social · 17/09/2026As the opposite of a computer toucher, I sometimes worry that I'm not keeping up with the development of things. Luckily, I'm smart enough to realize that if the "most dangerous" LLMs need warehouses full of GPUs to function, they can't just "break out" and start running on random PCs. 631303103
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 17/09/2026Alright, fine, I'll post a screenshot. The blank space at the top is a status bar, but it'll probably be mostly blank until you pause (not enough VRAM in this challenge to have the font loaded all the time!). Not pictured is the music, because that's audio and not a picture, but it's there. 120
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 16/09/2026They already have the microtractions down perfectly, so next, why not: - Streaks - Achievements - GIFs - Collectible, limited-time-only themes and costumes - Loot boxes and drops - Posting to social media - Leaderboards 000
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 16/09/2026Same; the way I coped was by saying "at least they're busy focusing on the half of the program I disabled completely, instead of breaking and doing unnecessary stuff to the parts of the program I DO use". Up until that bug where it tags your commits as co-authored even though it's disabled. :V 010
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 16/09/2026It says a lot to me that VS Code keeps adding things that make their robot interface seem more like a toy for dopamine-starved people rather than anything serious. Like, that's the audience for it. Gotta keep jingling the shiny keys for users or else they might stop wanting to be programmers. :( 220
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 16/09/2026"It would allow us to mass-produce personalized programs." Re-inventing the wheel 10,000 times means 10,000 unique sets of maintenance problems that need 10,000 unique solutions, none of which can be reliably shared or repeated across the 10,000 programs, and you're responsible for all of that. 110
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 16/09/2026"Automation allows us to distribute books and other useful goods. Why are you against that?" I'm not. Those are physical goods where each one needs to be assembled. Software isn't like that; you write/compile once and can infinitely distribute. No mass-production is necessary. 110
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 16/09/2026Sprite handler written, so now I can put sprites on the screen. I think this was the last thing before I can finally implement actors. So far, the process has been: Music engine > PPU queue > input reader > stage loader > tile queuer > sprite handler. 110
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 15/09/2026"It just cured cancer, do you still hate it?" Yes; that's a purpose-built model built for researchers trained to interpret the results, which is NOT the same as a "general knowledge" text predictor whose owners are trying to prove can replace everyone/everything (so we're scraping your work now). 110
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 13/09/2026With only enough VRAM for 64 tiles, I need to be able to dynamically swap out tiles for player animations and such, so I just wrote the code for it now. And then I refined how the level data works. And then I fixed some graphics. You know, I need to implement the player character soon. :P 110
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 12/09/2026Linda's Coffeehouse is closing and being replaced with a Linda's Coffeehouse. (Don't mind me, I'm just trying to reset the store's age back to 0 years so I can get the 'new shop' bonus from it again) 020
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 12/09/2026I think an improvement would be a "I have a hair trigger today" button where it just disables all of the animations, flourishes, and softens the sound effects for that session, and doesn't sass you for pressing it. 000
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 12/09/2026Over the course of my two years of using the app, I've had to abort my day's lessons a handful of times because the app made me too angry to continue. Some days, I'm more sensitive to its uncooperation than other days, but really I just want something better to use. 100
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 12/09/2026The absolute most frustrating thing about the owl app is when the speech recognition just refuses to recognize the word I'm trying to say. It's enough to really sour my mood for the rest of the lessons, and that's BEFORE we talk about how much the app sasses you when it marks something wrong. 100
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 11/09/2026Surprise, they also don't care about enforcing any kind of usage disclosures, because "it's hard to know what requires 'disclosure'". Did it consume tokens at any point? Then you have to disclose it. This isn't hard, you just don't want to do it for some reason. 000
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 11/09/2026This is from a programming-related space I visit semi-regularly (less frequently nowadays though), among other programming-related spaces who've banned *ahem* "smoking" without any issues. 100
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 11/09/2026"I know our restaurant's manager refuses to ban or isolate smoking to its own section despite complaints, and I know our manager is open about their side-gig doing PR for a cigarette company, but I think calling it a 'conflict of interest' is an overreaction." Give me a freaking break, [redacted]. 101
DragWx @dragwx.bsky.social · 10/09/2026"It's dangerous because it's so smart." No, it's dangerous because of its super-ability to be confidently wrong, give bad advice, break things, and STILL have so many of its users trust its every word without additional thought. 110