I think the age of AI has really cheapened work like this. It's clear this library was vibe-coded; it's clear enough that the python version of the library originally posted yesterday was vibe-coded; I didn't look at the original library but it would shock me not at all that it was vibe-coded. Often just one or two commits and a functional library, emoji all over the readme, "Clean and easy-to-use API", etc.
In many ways this is pretty amazing. Only a few years ago it would have been a huge pain in the ass to come across some valuable library only for it to be locked in some language I didn't understand or wasn't working in at that moment. But in other ways, maybe it feels a bit "cheap" now to do `claude -p "port this library to $LANG, make sure it works, do a good job" and I'm not sure there's a ton of... accomplishment? craft? care? in it.
However, the real challenge is what happens _later_, when the thing is done. Most people don't really think about maintenance, and move on to other things, making the thing they worked on stale and stagnant.
I think this applies here too: Vibe coding lets us create new _things_ quite easily, but we see value in places other than the sheer the existence of the project. We care about how the project is maintained, if it has a userbase, contributors, longevity. I think this is also part of why it feels so "cheap" and not genuine.
The integration hell isn't much easier, but I spend _far_ less time actually writing configurations, yaml files, looking up docs, etc, which frees up my time so that I can deal with the workplace politics involved... actually, maybe I want to go back.
// Check if sensor is available
if (sensor.isAvailable()) {
// Read current angle
double angle = sensor.readAngle();
TEST(SubSystemABCTest,CheckIfAIsNegativeItThrows)
{
....
}
Haha. Bold indeed.
I think the original human intent is to inflate mental share on hardware and/or time domain issues as those are just routine occurences in Arduino projects.
I’d be so much more impressed if OP had come up with an interesting use case for this “library” rather than just writing a single prompt and firing up a Show HN
macOS has hundreds of APIs. I’m not really convinced every single one needs a Claude wrapper library, nor am I convinced OP did any amount of interesting engineering work here.
It’s a bit like releasing a music album comprised entirely of Suno tracks - sure, it’s there, you can press play, but is it something to be proud of?
Who cares?
What's important is that now I have a useful library. The only complaint I'd give is that it might not be super optimized, but it's open source so you can instruct your agent to take it and optimize it for you :)
I feel like it is a painter who devalues the works which can be made with tools like Photoshop and Illustrator. It feels like elitism, while you could also value the lower barrier point of entry.
The analogy is very interesting, but I think perhaps I didn't do a good job of articulating my point - I feel I was trying to say that everyone*, myself included, is a Photoshop user now, and we know how much work it is or isn't to achieve some goal with it (which was previously impossible or difficult when we all just had paintbrushes and easels). I'm not doing a good job of articulating my point now either unfortunately.
Perhaps I'm trying to say that we all* own photocopiers now? I'm not sure.
I appreciate you taking an opposing view. I will think about my opinion some more.
I believe it is the (partly justified) worry that the craftmanship is devalued, or a tragedy of the commons scenario (the energy industry and meat industry are good examples here).
I've hold the same view about photocamera's (we all carry a digital one in pocket nowadays and can shoot as much as we want to), singing (autotune devalues singing putting more emphasis on the showbiz surrounding music artists), or VSTs (versus analog synths).
We end up with an overflow of information which we can no longer manually process. So we need tooling to do so (for example Spotify or Facebook algorithm).
But you still have people geeking over analog synths. In front row you will hear false notes of a singer. Entire websites and communities exist to filter out good pictures (the only thing I use Bing for is their daily wallpaper), and so on. I still use an analog synth because I love it, and 3 out of 4 family members are singing in leisure time (in an amateur group, but still). With regards to camera, I no longer appreciate such as much but pictures which win prizes I recognize (my father in 60s or 70s won a prize with a bw picture he developed in a dark room himself).
Programming long ago got devalued and it is a process. It perhaps started when delete/backspace got more common (as we no longer required punched cards) or even the succesors of the huge computer at Bletchley Park. But if people say it is all Python and JavaScript fault then I think about Visual Basic and believe something lowering the barrier point of entry was going to become popular. Same with MSDOS (cheap OS for PC), MS Windows (first GUI OS for many new PC users), iPhone (first popular capacitive touch smartphone). Each of these destroyed their predecessor, and such came with downsides which in hindsight seem obvious.
The history of GNOME (Gnome) and KDE is also interesting in this context. Both the licensing but also choice of programming languages. KDE comprising of C++ and GNOME of C, with something like Vala not taking up and GJS too late.
Again I don't want to come across as criticising the OP, I am just struggling with this myself. I've vibe-coded a few great things for myself but the value is so personal (and the lack of intention to maintain is so strong) that I would rather others build their own version than use mine!
Hacker News is already full of people too misanthropic and uncurious to engage with topics beyond the title. Now we don't even care about the art and science of programming. So why bother showing up? This place will be nothing but shitposting bots and self-promotion soon.
It's like complaining that the eggs at the supermarket are not homemade. It's an egg. Eat it. You can still raise your chickens.
But if you're into programming for the sake of the user, none of this matters.
For me, I appreciate the clean, complete documentation and code generated for use in this project - I see nothing wrong with it, its useful and functional, and I can easily integrate this library into an app I'm building to get the screen angle. From this perspective, for the sake of the user/developer, I'd say things were definitely improved over Plain Ol' Human Code™ ...
What I think I'm trying to say is that this specific kind of thing now takes everyone the same amount of time to create. It's "cheapened" this specific type of code. I'm not trying to say this particular library is bad or anything, just that converting some small library from one language to another no longer really holds much value, since essentially everyone can do exactly the same thing exactly the same way now, for the same time cost.
>everyone can do exactly the same thing exactly the same way now, for the same time cost.
It doesn't have to be cool. It just has to work.
What I suppose I'm unsure about is the value of publishing utility code when the cost of bespoke creation is so low. But there are a couple of interesting perspectives in the responses so now I have to go away and think about it some more :)
(https://github.com/ufoym/mac-angle/blob/main/angle.cpp#L186)
The most I can reach on mine is 132deg