path: root/2025/captions/emacsconf-2025-llm--emacs-editors-and-llm-driven-workflows--andrew-hyatt--answers.vtt

WEBVTT

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So let's, I'm just going to answer

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the questions as I see them on the pad.

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So yeah, this first question is really good.

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And I think it's actually this great thing

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that I did not mention is that like,

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if you have unsaved buffers,

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which is, you know, when you're actually doing editing,

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most buffers are unsaved.

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really you need something tightly integrated with Emacs

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to deal with that.

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So things like, you know,

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I demonstrated Copilot,

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I demonstrated Gptel,

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things like those things, things like Ellama,

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these things will all work with unsaved buffers

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because they work via, you know, the input is the buffer.

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as opposed to a file.

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Things like Claude Code, Gemini Code, et cetera,

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those are working with files.

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They have no idea what is going on with your buffers.

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And it could be that you can solve this problem

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by using this thing called MCP,

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which kind of gives the coding agent

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a way to see anything in particular.

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In this case, it would be Emacs

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and the state of your buffers.

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But I think that's not a particularly great solution

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if that's how you want to work.

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But I think that's kind of like

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if you're in the Claude Code

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that kind of world where you know things are happening,

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basically through a terminal.

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It's okay, like you typically

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would not be doing a mix of things.

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You would just be doing things either

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in one place or the other place.

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You know, it could be that you switch off

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from one place to another,

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but you wouldn't be doing both at the same time.

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And it's kind of a, you tend to just fall into one,

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you know,

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editing outside the editor or editing inside the editor.

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And I find myself switching between the two

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when I use those kinds of tools.

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So David, let me interrupt you for just one moment.

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I want to just take care to read out

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the question that we're answering.

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The question was, my biggest question with AI code editors

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trying to integrate with Emacs is,

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are the AI code editors able to read unsaved buffers

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and not just saved files?

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Sorry. Yes. Yeah. Thank you for reminding me to.

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I will read the questions from now on.

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But yes, that's what I think about.

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that interesting questions about unsaved buffers.

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The next question is,

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I don't agree with the comment you made

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about VS code usage dying out

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because I see companies and products

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pushing for tightly integrated agent

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and products like Windsurf.

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So thoughts on that?

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Yeah, I mean, it's really hard

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to be certain of anything,

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like things are changing very fast

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and it's very hard to predict the future.

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But the trend I see is that um,

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the sort of outside editing experience

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where you just kind of instruct a model,

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what to do is getting better.

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And as long as that keeps getting better,

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I think that's going to lessen the demand

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for these tightly integrated editing experiences.

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So it could be that, um, a lot of people,

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especially in, you know, corporate environments

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just start using,

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they're going to use whatever is

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going to make the most productive.

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And I think right now, it's not clear that that will be,

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you know, the very agent-based, you know,

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command line-centric way of doing things.

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But it certainly, the trend is, if that continues,

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I think it probably will be like that.

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So I think we'll have to see.

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I don't think your opinion is unreasonable.

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I guess I'm kind of cautiously saying

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I think it's gonna be the opposite, but I guess we'll see.

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Like, let's reconvene in a year and see what happens.

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Uh, the 3rd question answer,

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do you have any thoughts about the environmental costs

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of using either the training

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of the models are we can download or use locally

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or the larger commercial models used from the cloud.

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Um, I think. The, you know, I'm on social media,

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probably a little bit more than I should be.

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And I do see a lot of discussion there

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and a lot of concern about the environmental costs of using LLMs.

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I've looked into this as I'm also concerned

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about keeping my environmental footprint personally down.

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And I do this in many ways,

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but I certainly don't want to kind of like blow that all the water

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because I'm using LLMs so much.

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I think that the concerns are mostly overblown.

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There's a concern that, well, it uses a lot of energy.

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In aggregate, the total amount of energy

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used by the data centers in the US is a few percent.

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And this is a fraction. I think this is like LM's account

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for something like 20% now

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of all data center usage, which is a lot.

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But Those data centers are doing lots of things.

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They all need to be water cooled.

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Um, if you like per LLM prompt,

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the costs are relatively small

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and by relatively small, I mean,

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you know, people have said online,

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well, it's like a few bottles of water per prompt.

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That, that is not true. It is much, much less than that.

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It's a fraction of that.

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So, uh, I don't think the answer is nothing,

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but I would say it's, I would say you probably,

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if you want the most bang for your environmental buck,

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probably the best thing for you to do

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is take less flights and things like that.

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Like, yes, you can cut down on this,

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but I think it's pretty marginal at the moment.

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We do probably need to think about the total costs

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like of humanity using all of this.

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Like a lot of stuff you'll see

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corporations are using a lot of these things.

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And so like, just like if you look

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at water usage or energy uses in total,

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it's like really corporations that are using this.

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So there might, there's a lot of leverage there

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to make things more efficient as opposed to personal use.

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So I think it's wise to be cautious,

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but I think it's okay, I think, at least for personal use.

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The next question is another,

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yeah, this is also disagreeing with me about VS Code,

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but it says, I must say I liked your conclusion,

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but I differ insofar as you said that VS Code differs from Emacs

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because the former is not as easy to adapt as the latter.

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But why should Microsoft not adapt VS Code

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as we adapt Emacs for the new era of coding?

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And why would VS Code be harder hit?

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Could you please elaborate on this point? Yeah, thanks.

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This is a good question.

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I think maybe I wasn't as sharp on my point as I could be.

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Because I think the core

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of what I'm saying is like, there is a going to be a trend.

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I believe there will be a trend away from editing.

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And if we are going to be editing less,

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I think VS Code, like people will be in editors less.

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And that means people will be in VS Code less,

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people will probably be in Emacs less.

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And yes, I think you can, VS Code

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is to some degree extensible.

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but I think there's less of a community, or that is,

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I think the people using Emacs

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have used Emacs for a long time.

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They're going to continue to use Emacs.

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I speak for myself, but I know

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a lot of people here are kind of like this,

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and they're going to just, like,

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we have a lot of momentum to keep doing things in Emacs,

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and especially because we have a lot of things

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that we already do in Emacs.

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We do to-do lists and, you know, with org mode

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and some people read email

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and some people are using

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shells in Emacs and all these things,

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I think will make Emacs

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kind of a better environment

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if you want to do various editing like things in Emacs.

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In, you know, in an editing environment,

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because I think just emails can edit

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more types of things I think will naturally

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be a bit more useful than VS code,

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which people are really just using to edit code

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and if people find it less useful to edit code.

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I think it's VS code will be harder hit than emails

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because that's its whole like that's in the name

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like the whole reason for it

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to be doing things as to edit code.

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So I think that it's it's vulnerable

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in a way that Emacs isn't

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just because emacs is so very...

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you know, it's, it could do so many things

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and and people use it for so many different kinds of things

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that it's I think it's going to be

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a little bit more resilient.

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But as I said with the present.

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For those of us that are using Emacs,

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it's everywhere for us.

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Not necessarily everyone is an I live in Emacs person,

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but whatever you're using Emacs for,

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it is the thing you reach for to do that thing.

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Is that touching on the point?

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Yeah, that's a great way to say it.

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Thank you. Thank you, Colin. Yeah.

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Thank you. Thank you for that question.

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Do you think we're falling behind in productivity as Emacs users

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compared to all these VS code forks

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that have a thousand button and text boxes everywhere,

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which are basically much richer UIs,

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which are basically web pages?

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I do think Emacs is falling behind in some ways.

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I mean, it's definitely showing its age a little bit,

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especially you mentioned richer UIs

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that are basically web pages.

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I mean, this I think is one of the big problems Emacs has

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is that it uses a very, you know, a much more ancient way

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of kind of doing UIs that is not particularly flexible

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and not particularly comfortable for any modern UI coder.

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And I think if you look at the Emacs stuff out there,

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like, yes, you can do a few things with UIs.

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You can have some amount of UI richness,

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but it's pretty limited.

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And I kind of, if there's one thing

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I could wish for in Emacs,

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it's sort of like, I kind of wish Emacs could be on a,

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could be built on top of basically like Atom or something like that,

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where it's like a web framework

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that allows us to write actual rich pages,

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rich UIs in a modern style using things like CSS

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instead of the kinds of things Emacs lets you do.

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But that said, that is an advantage

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of VS Code and other editors like that.

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I think that Emacs does a good job

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of eventually catching up

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to all sorts of things people are doing in other editors.

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It's often that other editors get there first,

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but there's a lot of momentum

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to kind of keep Emacs fresh, keep it modern.

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And it's pretty easy to- I love that.

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I forgot about the lag. We do have a little bit of lag,

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but I just, I find that very captivating.

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We have with technologies

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like Apache Cassandra in the database world,

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we have this idea of eventual concurrency.

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And you make me think with Emacs,

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we have this idea of eventual feature parity, right?

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If a feature stays desirable long enough,

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Emacs will eventually grow it.

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I think that's a very contagious idea. Yeah, yeah, thanks.

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I hope that idea makes sense. And I hope it's correct,

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because I think that I do want Emacs to continue to succeed.

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And I personally, using Emacs,

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do not feel myself falling behind in productivity.

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That said, there's a lot of ways that Emacs can improve

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and should improve on this front.

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And a lot of these ways are pretty fundamental.

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So I kind of hope people pay a lot of attention

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to some of these more fundamental lower-level Emacs things

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that really allows the packages

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to do more richer and better things.

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Sorry, you have a ton of questions.

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I shouldn't be doing so much active listening.

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No, no, I appreciate your input.

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OK, next is I've been using Claude Code extensively.

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I recently switched to Agent Shell with Claude Code.

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Have you tried it? And what are your thoughts?

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I actually have tried Agent Shell.

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And currently, I recorded this video like three months ago.

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So Agent Shell did not exist then.

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If Agent Shell did exist,

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I probably would have demoed it as well.

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Agent Hell is great in the sense of it's

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It does use comment, which is the way that I think all Emacs users

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would prefer to interact with something like Claude Code,

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or any of those types of tools, which is like, I don't.

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Um, the other,

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but it's a trade-off it uses like on the back

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and it's, it has a common buffer.

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And then on the back end, it's using a protocol

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to talk to agent, uh, to Claude Code and other things.

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The problem is this has a lot of problems.

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For example, like you don't have

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completion of slash commands.

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You don't have, um, if you ask to see the, in Claude Code,

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you can get a visual representation of. the context window.

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But you can't do this. I mean, last time I tried,

00:13:30.240 --> 00:13:31.719
I couldn't do this in agent shell.

00:13:31.720 --> 00:13:33.399
It's progressing rapidly.

00:13:33.400 --> 00:13:37.479
But it's not as rich in functionality

00:13:37.480 --> 00:13:40.119
as using quad code directly.

00:13:40.120 --> 00:13:44.839
On the other hand, because it's letting Emacs be Emacs

00:13:44.840 --> 00:13:49.239
and using comment, it's a much better experience

00:13:49.240 --> 00:13:50.919
to actually give instructions.

00:13:50.920 --> 00:13:56.519
I think the maximum power, though, is, to me,

00:13:56.520 --> 00:13:58.479
the best way is still like, you know,

00:13:58.480 --> 00:13:59.399
do your editing in org mode,

00:13:59.400 --> 00:14:02.359
and then just tell, you could have,

00:14:02.360 --> 00:14:06.959
you know, the richer experience of using

00:14:06.960 --> 00:14:13.639
of using Claude Code in, in it's more like shell like form

00:14:13.640 --> 00:14:15.559
where everything is, it's much, you know,

00:14:15.560 --> 00:14:17.079
designed to be used in the terminal,

00:14:17.080 --> 00:14:18.759
but you don't have to type in that much

00:14:18.760 --> 00:14:20.039
because you're really doing your typing

00:14:20.040 --> 00:14:21.439
in order to me, I think there's

00:14:21.440 --> 00:14:23.519
kind of the sweet spot that I like.

00:14:23.520 --> 00:14:26.639
Um, but HHL is a great step forward

00:14:26.640 --> 00:14:29.879
and I think it's, uh, it's quite good to use.

00:14:29.880 --> 00:14:32.119
And I, I personally use it a lot.

00:14:32.120 --> 00:14:40.479
Um, OK, so in terms of, next question,

00:14:40.480 --> 00:14:41.839
in terms of agent selection,

00:14:41.840 --> 00:14:44.639
what has been your experience with different agents?

00:14:44.640 --> 00:14:48.079
And have you had any success with hosting your own models

00:14:48.080 --> 00:14:49.439
and using open weights?

00:14:49.440 --> 00:14:54.159
I think there's, you know, many people

00:14:54.160 --> 00:14:56.519
have many different opinions on this.

00:14:56.520 --> 00:15:00.839
I think Claude Code is, most people I know

00:15:00.840 --> 00:15:03.479
would say Claude Code is probably,

00:15:03.480 --> 00:15:07.479
sorry, Cloud is probably the best for coding right now.

00:15:07.480 --> 00:15:09.919
Gemini can be very hit and miss even with 3.0,

00:15:09.920 --> 00:15:12.519
but Claude is quite good.

00:15:12.520 --> 00:15:16.119
4.5 Opus is actually relatively cheap

00:15:16.120 --> 00:15:21.119
compared to the previous version of 4.1 Opus.

00:15:21.120 --> 00:15:24.239
There's other models out there,

00:15:24.240 --> 00:15:29.159
but I think most people just stick with Claude

00:15:29.160 --> 00:15:33.999
because it's very reliable, it's very good,

00:15:34.000 --> 00:15:36.479
and nothing is obviously better than that.

00:15:36.480 --> 00:15:41.039
And as far as DeepSeek is pretty good as well,

00:15:41.040 --> 00:15:42.079
and then much cheaper.

00:15:42.080 --> 00:15:46.839
I've had some good luck using that locally,

00:15:46.840 --> 00:15:50.159
but actually the problem is for my day-to-day machine,

00:15:50.160 --> 00:15:53.079
like my personal machine,

00:15:53.080 --> 00:15:55.679
it's not powerful enough to run anything locally.

00:15:55.680 --> 00:15:58.479
And my work machine, it is powerful enough,

00:15:58.480 --> 00:16:02.079
but I can spend my company's money at will

00:16:02.080 --> 00:16:03.759
on more powerful models.

00:16:03.760 --> 00:16:05.519
So there's really not a lot of incentive

00:16:05.520 --> 00:16:06.439
for me to run locally.

00:16:06.440 --> 00:16:12.199
I think, as far as I know, I haven't heard

00:16:12.200 --> 00:16:14.359
of local models being incredible,

00:16:14.360 --> 00:16:16.879
but I think you can get reasonable quality with them.

00:16:16.880 --> 00:16:19.159
That is, especially if you're doing

00:16:19.160 --> 00:16:20.279
relatively simple things,

00:16:20.280 --> 00:16:25.679
I think it's pretty reasonable to be using those.

00:16:25.680 --> 00:16:29.959
Also, they tend to be slower

00:16:29.960 --> 00:16:33.279
than the models that are elsewhere

00:16:33.280 --> 00:16:36.319
just because they just have more horsepower,

00:16:36.320 --> 00:16:38.679
they can churn through those tokens a little quicker.

00:16:38.680 --> 00:16:44.719
So, I'll just break in here to say,

00:16:44.720 --> 00:16:46.239
we've got about 7 minutes left

00:16:46.240 --> 00:16:49.239
before we're cutting over this great discussion so far.

00:16:49.240 --> 00:16:50.839
I'm very happy to keep going.

00:16:50.840 --> 00:16:55.399
There's no time limit, but at a certain point,

00:16:55.400 --> 00:16:56.479
I may have to leave

00:16:56.480 --> 00:16:58.679
to jump in and prep with the next speaker,

00:16:58.680 --> 00:17:00.359
but you'll be able to keep going

00:17:00.360 --> 00:17:02.599
as long as you have the steam for it.

00:17:02.600 --> 00:17:06.159
Yeah, I think we have 3 questions. Yeah, thanks.

00:17:06.160 --> 00:17:08.239
I think we have 3 questions.

00:17:08.240 --> 00:17:09.719
Let's see if we can get through them

00:17:09.720 --> 00:17:17.359
all in that time period. OK, this one is interesting talk.

00:17:17.360 --> 00:17:20.439
I'll start by asking it for everything, but is it editing?

00:17:20.440 --> 00:17:23.239
I think there's more of a comment than a question.

00:17:23.240 --> 00:17:29.719
So yes, let us all ask, but is it editing?

00:17:29.720 --> 00:17:33.439
All right. I can move on to the comment area.

00:17:33.440 --> 00:17:40.319
I'm reading angst in your thinking about AI editing.

00:17:40.320 --> 00:17:41.839
I think that's true.

00:17:41.840 --> 00:17:44.119
It says, and the question continues with,

00:17:44.120 --> 00:17:45.159
what are you excited about?

00:17:45.160 --> 00:17:48.719
Wow, that's an interesting question.

00:17:48.720 --> 00:17:53.799
I mean, I think there are possibilities.

00:17:53.800 --> 00:17:58.719
Like, yes, people are going in sort of a relatively obvious direction

00:17:58.720 --> 00:18:01.439
with LLMs right now.

00:18:01.440 --> 00:18:04.599
And I think there's lots of opportunities,

00:18:04.600 --> 00:18:07.839
clever opportunities to do things

00:18:07.840 --> 00:18:11.079
we couldn't have thought of Things that are useful,

00:18:11.080 --> 00:18:14.919
but in ways that are not super obvious to us,

00:18:14.920 --> 00:18:18.519
and I think I'm still excited

00:18:18.520 --> 00:18:23.839
about the possibilities of using them in ways that are super helpful

00:18:23.840 --> 00:18:29.319
and different than. normal. I'll give you an example.

00:18:29.320 --> 00:18:33.199
This is something that I intend to, I think,

00:18:33.200 --> 00:18:36.479
post on Reddit in a few days,

00:18:36.480 --> 00:18:39.399
but I have a extension to eshell

00:18:39.400 --> 00:18:43.439
where you can prefix a command with at,

00:18:43.440 --> 00:18:45.199
and then just tell it what you want to do,

00:18:45.200 --> 00:18:46.919
and it will substitute the command

00:18:46.920 --> 00:18:51.919
that you are thinking of. Because often, I do not remember.

00:18:51.920 --> 00:18:56.919
I never remember, like, how do you find a file in a directory tree,

00:18:56.920 --> 00:19:00.159
you know, recursing? Who can remember how to do that?

00:19:00.160 --> 00:19:04.799
It's like a find, and there's like a dash print there somewhere.

00:19:04.800 --> 00:19:10.159
Yes. There are some smart people who remember this

00:19:10.160 --> 00:19:11.199
but I am not one of them.

00:19:11.200 --> 00:19:13.639
And so I think like something like this is like you just type out,

00:19:13.640 --> 00:19:17.279
find me this file, and it will substitute

00:19:17.280 --> 00:19:18.879
the correct command.

00:19:18.880 --> 00:19:20.999
I think this is, there's a lot of little,

00:19:21.000 --> 00:19:24.319
little tweaks you could do like, you know, if you want the AI,

00:19:24.320 --> 00:19:26.679
it could be there for you. And it will help you.

00:19:26.680 --> 00:19:27.559
And if you don't want it,

00:19:27.560 --> 00:19:28.919
it's not going to get in your way.

00:19:28.920 --> 00:19:30.639
And I think this is where eMath can really shine.

00:19:30.640 --> 00:19:33.079
It can really take advantage of LLMs,

00:19:33.080 --> 00:19:35.799
but still remain true to its kind of editing experience,

00:19:35.800 --> 00:19:39.319
because it's not forcing you to use LLMs all the time.

00:19:39.320 --> 00:19:43.919
So thank you for that great question.

00:19:43.920 --> 00:19:47.919
And then the final question. Yep.

00:19:47.920 --> 00:19:50.839
This final question is, why does it matter to have a richer UI?

00:19:50.840 --> 00:19:53.439
All this left is basically running and getting the results.

00:19:53.440 --> 00:19:56.119
I think maybe this is a response to me complaining

00:19:56.120 --> 00:19:58.479
about Emacs not having a richer UI before,

00:19:58.480 --> 00:20:03.159
but I think it does matter a lot for all sorts of things.

00:20:03.160 --> 00:20:07.159
It's hard to kind of explain succinctly

00:20:07.160 --> 00:20:08.519
because I'm talking about UI

00:20:08.520 --> 00:20:09.759
and I'd have to show you things.

00:20:09.760 --> 00:20:14.599
But it should be just something like oh I have an error

00:20:14.600 --> 00:20:15.799
and I'm using flymake and I'm,

00:20:15.800 --> 00:20:17.759
I'm using the you know I have options

00:20:17.760 --> 00:20:19.839
where it'll show me the error in line

00:20:19.840 --> 00:20:22.639
by like underlining things and having a little message,

00:20:22.640 --> 00:20:24.079
but like, you know what that message

00:20:24.080 --> 00:20:26.399
doesn't appear quite right, a lot of the times,

00:20:26.400 --> 00:20:30.159
or here's another one like. I program in Python a lot.

00:20:30.160 --> 00:20:33.479
And Python, it's super hard to program in

00:20:33.480 --> 00:20:35.279
unless you have these little vertical lines

00:20:35.280 --> 00:20:37.599
that shows you what the indents are. At least I find it.

00:20:37.600 --> 00:20:40.479
There are two packages that do that.

00:20:40.480 --> 00:20:43.039
None of them do it particularly well,

00:20:43.040 --> 00:20:44.599
just because Emacs at its base

00:20:44.600 --> 00:20:45.919
does not allow you to do this.

00:20:45.920 --> 00:20:47.759
And so you kind of have to hack it in.

00:20:47.760 --> 00:20:49.479
And there's lots of ways to mess it up.

00:20:49.480 --> 00:20:52.799
And when editing, you'll find yourself messing this thing up.

00:20:52.800 --> 00:20:57.159
regularly. So it doesn't look quite clean.

00:20:57.160 --> 00:20:59.079
And like, there's little artifacts,

00:20:59.080 --> 00:21:01.039
or, you know, there's little ways that it,

00:21:01.040 --> 00:21:02.359
it kind of gets things wrong,

00:21:02.360 --> 00:21:06.279
or you can, you can get things wrong with it.

00:21:06.280 --> 00:21:10.039
So I think that, like,

00:21:10.040 --> 00:21:11.879
there's a lot of issues with that sort of thing.

00:21:11.880 --> 00:21:15.759
And, and also, like, you know,

00:21:15.760 --> 00:21:17.719
what if you want to do something like play a video inline,

00:21:17.720 --> 00:21:19.559
like, I don't know, you might should be able to do that,

00:21:19.560 --> 00:21:20.839
you might should be able to do anything.

00:21:20.840 --> 00:21:23.799
But right now it just can't and I think

00:21:23.800 --> 00:21:24.999
a lot of the reason as well

00:21:25.000 --> 00:21:26.519
we you know we wanted to be compatible

00:21:26.520 --> 00:21:29.919
with you know TRS 80 machines or something like that

00:21:29.920 --> 00:21:33.159
and it's this is important this really is important,

00:21:33.160 --> 00:21:34.719
but I hope there's some way

00:21:34.720 --> 00:21:36.079
that we can kind of eventually figure out

00:21:36.080 --> 00:21:39.279
how to get the best of you know both compatibility and.

00:21:39.280 --> 00:21:44.879
more modern UIs. So, you know, we can have more modern UIs

00:21:44.880 --> 00:21:49.839
for people that have modern machines and other people

00:21:49.840 --> 00:21:51.959
either do without that functionality

00:21:51.960 --> 00:21:54.319
or sort of fall back to some reasonable default.

00:21:54.320 --> 00:21:59.079
So we have about 30 seconds or a minute.

00:21:59.080 --> 00:22:00.679
I know there's one more question.

00:22:00.680 --> 00:22:01.559
I'd love for you to get to it.

00:22:01.560 --> 00:22:02.839
I just want to make sure that

00:22:02.840 --> 00:22:04.239
while we're still live on stream,

00:22:04.240 --> 00:22:05.519
you get a chance to share

00:22:05.520 --> 00:22:06.799
any closing remarks you might have.

00:22:06.800 --> 00:22:10.879
Thank you for that. Um, yes.

00:22:10.880 --> 00:22:14.519
So first of all, I want to thank everyone involved for listening.

00:22:14.520 --> 00:22:18.919
And I want to thank the core when I think thanks for moderating this.

00:22:18.920 --> 00:22:21.279
And Sacha, thank you for putting that together.

00:22:21.280 --> 00:22:21.919
And I know there's more people

00:22:21.920 --> 00:22:23.319
that are working behind the scenes.

00:22:23.320 --> 00:22:25.079
So thank you all for putting this together.

00:22:25.080 --> 00:22:29.199
I'm so happy that we all are here. We care about Emacs.

00:22:29.200 --> 00:22:31.199
We're pushing Emacs forward.

00:22:31.200 --> 00:22:35.959
We are I think Emacs remains

00:22:35.960 --> 00:22:37.279
this really remarkable achievement.

00:22:37.280 --> 00:22:41.799
Like it's amazing that it exists. It continues to exist.

00:22:41.800 --> 00:22:42.999
It hasn't got, it's hard.

00:22:43.000 --> 00:22:45.159
It's like, really, there's a lot of work to go into it.

00:22:45.160 --> 00:22:47.559
So I think let's all just appreciate everyone who,

00:22:47.560 --> 00:22:50.679
who like contributes and makes all of this possible.

00:22:50.680 --> 00:22:52.159
Cause it's, if you ever read

00:22:52.160 --> 00:22:53.279
the Emacs Develop mailing list,

00:22:53.280 --> 00:22:55.479
it's a lot of work, a lot of deep thinking,

00:22:55.480 --> 00:22:56.679
a lot of careful thinking.

00:22:56.680 --> 00:22:58.599
And I think this is really important.

00:22:58.600 --> 00:23:02.039
So thank you, especially to the maintainers of Emacs

00:23:02.040 --> 00:23:04.199
and everyone who's contributing to the core experience,

00:23:04.200 --> 00:23:07.759
all the libraries, all the LLM stuff we mentioned before.

00:23:07.760 --> 00:23:09.839
You're all doing such a fantastic job.

00:23:09.840 --> 00:23:13.799
It's exciting to be here. Thank you for your talk, Andrew.

00:23:13.800 --> 00:23:16.159
It's been just fascinating.

00:23:16.160 --> 00:23:19.759
If you don't mind, I'd love to jump

00:23:19.760 --> 00:23:23.879
right over to the last question. OK, let's do that.

00:23:23.880 --> 00:23:27.599
It says, I have 45 plus years editing programming.

00:23:27.600 --> 00:23:29.239
I'm not sure I can think about things

00:23:29.240 --> 00:23:31.039
without thinking of buffers, editors, et cetera.

00:23:31.040 --> 00:23:31.959
Is this the handicap?

00:23:31.960 --> 00:23:34.239
Should we have people with no experience

00:23:34.240 --> 00:23:35.319
with code learning to prompt?

00:23:35.320 --> 00:23:38.799
Well, this is something I do have a strong opinion about.

00:23:38.800 --> 00:23:42.159
I feel like I do not want to see people that have no experience

00:23:42.160 --> 00:23:44.119
with code learning to prompt. I think it's very limited

00:23:44.120 --> 00:23:46.039
what you could do right now with that.

00:23:46.040 --> 00:23:48.439
Like you could do, if you could sort of one-shot it,

00:23:48.440 --> 00:23:51.999
that is like, I have something that's relatively easy,

00:23:52.000 --> 00:23:54.879
And it could do it, and I'm going to tell it to do it,

00:23:54.880 --> 00:23:56.039
and then I'm going to give feedback.

00:23:56.040 --> 00:24:00.039
OK, as long as this is for relatively short-lived things,

00:24:00.040 --> 00:24:02.599
I think that works well. But for people who really care

00:24:02.600 --> 00:24:04.279
about the longevity of their code,

00:24:04.280 --> 00:24:06.599
really care about software engineering,

00:24:06.600 --> 00:24:09.879
which is software engineering is very different than just writing code.

00:24:09.880 --> 00:24:11.879
Software engineering is about maintainability.

00:24:11.880 --> 00:24:15.119
Software engineering is making sure everything is scalable

00:24:15.120 --> 00:24:19.599
and all sorts of things that it's unlikely,

00:24:19.600 --> 00:24:21.759
I think, that an LM is going to get right.

00:24:21.760 --> 00:24:25.279
And I've seen a lot of bad cases

00:24:25.280 --> 00:24:27.199
where people who don't understand code

00:24:27.200 --> 00:24:31.159
are doing things and it's not working well

00:24:31.160 --> 00:24:33.239
because they don't understand

00:24:33.240 --> 00:24:35.279
some of the some of the complexities

00:24:35.280 --> 00:24:36.959
or some of the concerns that that you might have

00:24:36.960 --> 00:24:43.279
in maintaining a piece of code.

00:24:43.280 --> 00:24:45.759
So I think those people who have lots of experience

00:24:45.760 --> 00:24:46.959
are the best people to use this.

00:24:46.960 --> 00:24:48.119
And I think that's what we're seeing

00:24:48.120 --> 00:24:49.079
in the industry as well,

00:24:49.080 --> 00:24:51.639
where more senior people are doing quite well

00:24:51.640 --> 00:24:54.599
because they're able to use LLMs

00:24:54.600 --> 00:24:56.559
more effectively than junior people.

00:24:56.560 --> 00:25:00.999
That may all even out because LLMs get even better,

00:25:01.000 --> 00:25:03.079
but for now hasn't happened.

00:25:03.080 --> 00:25:06.319
So I think, you know, I also have a ton of experience,

00:25:06.320 --> 00:25:13.079
not 45 years, but a lot. And, and I think that it's those,

00:25:13.080 --> 00:25:14.839
those years of experience will only help you.

00:25:14.840 --> 00:25:16.919
And I think it's, it's, it's a great,

00:25:16.920 --> 00:25:19.639
it's great to kind of dip your toes in the water

00:25:19.640 --> 00:25:20.732
and see what you can do.