Oceanside Software Corporation

Artificial Intelligence was once a topic reserved for research scientists and Hollywood movies.

In my pre-teen and teenage years, I remember feeling inspired by watching The Jetsons, E.T., Short Circuit, RoboCop and of course Star Wars. I imagined someday building a robot of my own, for no purpose other than expressing creativity through engineering.

But as inspirational as that was, by the time I earned my Computer Science degree, A.I. really wasn’t something advanced enough to add value to my life as a Software Engineer.

Yet what feels like an overnight transition, artificial intelligence has advanced so rapidly and so far, that current teenagers feeling the same inspiration I felt while watching those movies, could use A.I. to perform mundane tasks that take humans far more time and effort, without mistakes.

Robot kits are within the intellectual reach of youth, but as fun as that still seems to me, there’s one thing in my life that I need more of. Time!

I now have over 2 decades of post graduate experience in the software engineering industry. I still love my job and exude passion for architecting applications and coding for 16 hours a day. My brain rewards me with an endless supply of dopamine injections as I solve mini problems throughout the day while usually expressing myself through the C # programming language.

I once had a strong passion for the sport of motocross (If not for recurrent injuries I’d still be expressing that passion.). Just like many other sports, there is one mental phenomenon that we all sought to catch, to keep and to harness its powers; a state of mind referred to as “flow”.

I also experience flow as a Software Engineer, mostly while in the development phase. Since I have much more training and expertise writing software, flow’s arrival is far more predictable and prevalent than it was for me during motocross.

Since I enjoy writing software so much, as long as the task at hand isn’t overly mundane, outside of spontaneous disruptions and a day of meetings, keeping that focus for the duration of the day is only broken by an overly mundane task at hand.

In the context of the .Net Framework, creating interface files for an API, POCOs for database ORM interaction, enforcement of conventions, and autocomplete for LINQ suggestions are features of development tools that are standard, but are a form of artificial intelligence.

However, GitHub co-pilot goes beyond this in ways I have heard many other experienced developers describe as “freaky accurate” when it comes to predicting not just their next keystroke, but large swaths of code and algorithms.

To be clear, I took part in the trial of co-pilot, but I never actually used it. I was listening to the “.Net Rocks” podcast when I first heard about it, quickly jotted down the name and later downloaded it, but the trial expired before I made time to use it.

Often times new tooling can disrupt one’s flow and as promising as those tools sound, most of us developers have experienced enough disappointments over the years that it’s sometimes best to wait for the product to mature and for additional feedback to be written.
It is now of my opinion that the time has come for me to give co-pilot a shot. It sounds like an auto-complete algorithm on steroids and this survey is enough evidence for me to believe that co-pilot will help me keep ”the flow” by filling in those mundane segments and reducing a few Google searches to remind me of a particular algorithm or even create initial test cases.

Am I worried that A.I. will replace the coding part of my job?

No, but it’s going to change development forever. It could help offset the rising cost of software development for customers and enforce consistency in adhering to coding standards that new developers sometimes lack.

I am excited for the application of A.I. in my day to day job. The more time I can save performing mundane tasks, the more time I will be able to spend focussed and in the flow of a more complex algorithm, class or library.

If this tool doesn’t workout for me, I’ll be surprised. However, even the most mundane portions of software development do not bore me as did other tasks in my more youthful years, working to pay the bills as I searched for my passion.

Most memorable was my job plugging car alarm disarm switches, on an auto parts factory assembly line, in my early 20’s. For 8 hours a day I had to pick up a connector, plug in 3 wires and apply the tape label before sitting it in a bin. It wasn’t a difficult job but it was so mundane that I had to work hard to find a flow, and walked in each day intent on breaking my previous day and personal record, just to force time to pass more quickly.

It took me a while to find my passion before I chose Computer Science. Maybe the myriad of positions I held before graduating from college 22 years ago, at the age of 27, help me appreciate even the most mundane software development tasks.

It’s not that I need these tools to perform my job, but it sounds like it will take productivity to the next level and this excites me the most. For better or worse, and for as long as I can remember, I walk away from the day judging myself on how much I accomplish and all of the personal optimization tricks I have found, don’t compare to the percentage of productivity improvements they sited in this article.

The developers in the study who used co-pilot completed tasks 55% faster than those who didn’t. 73% reported that it helped them stay in the flow and as much as 75% reported feeling more satisfaction while coding with co-pilot.

It sounds like a formula for added job satisfaction, and substantially improved productivity, which definitely helps a developer remain in the the flow.

What do you think about A.I. as a tool in engineering? If the stats in this survey are accurate, I worry the veteran developers who resist will be left behind.

Jason Brower

A Year In, GitHub Measures AI-Based Copilot's Productivity Boost -- Visual Studio Magazine There's no doubt that GitHub's 'AI pair programmer,' Copilot, has shaken up the dev world, but by how much?

If you are a software developer and use Visual Studio, you might be excited to learn that Microsoft has released their first version of Visual Studio to take advantage of a 64-bit processor.

Visual Studio 2022 Preview 1.0 is here and it is finally 64-bit aware!

If you work with large solutions or you use a third party tool that tends to hog memory resources, 64-bit Visual Studio could be your (and our) fix.

Third party tools like JetBrains ReSharper provide tremendous value by enforcing code quality and providing decades old refactoring algorithms. However, it uses so much memory that it has a habit of crashing the Visual Studio 2019 and prior 32-bit process.

Although Microsoft has made tremendous progress towards their own code quality and refactoring algorithms, they haven't quite caught up with the power of ReSharper and other similar commercial offerings.

Interestingly the installer is choosing an x86 filesystem path for the storage of the "Shared Components, Tools and SDKs". Third party tool developers will probably need some time before they release 64-bit address space counterparts to their existing 32-bit tools.

Wish me luck! -Jason Brower

Visual Studio 2022 Preview 1 now available! We’re excited to announce that the first preview release of Visual Studio 2022 is ready to install! This is the first release of a 64-bit Visual Studio and we’d love for you to download it, try it out, and join us in shaping the next major release of Visual Studio with your feedback.

My passion for architecting and writing software far exceeds the extras that come along with leading others or business ownership. I feel fortunate now 21 years into my engineering career and I still get to spend most of my time designing software.

This article speaks about the problems that come along with expertise that eventually moves most employees out of the job that once made them feel passionate about coming to work, and places them into tedious leadership tasks they learn to loath.

How have you avoided this in your technical careers, or have you? Starting Oceanside Software over 12 years ago was the best decision I made with respect to that question. I usually have the opportunity to spend most of my time doing what I love. Designing Point of Sale and Credit Card Processing Software (to be honest, any software excites me). -Jason B.

Why Most Programmers End Up Being (or Are) Underperforming Technical Leads And how not to be one

Has anyone else been affected by the power outages in Texas? We are doing ok, but concerned for restaurant owners that were already hit by the pandemic’s blows.

When will normalcy be normal again?

(BTW we have now had consistent power for the last 24 hours.)