Microsoft: Computer Programming Is Dying, Long Live AI Literacy
- Reference: 0180867612
- News link: https://news.slashdot.org/story/26/02/27/1335243/microsoft-computer-programming-is-dying-long-live-ai-literacy
- Source link:
> On Tuesday, Microsoft GM of Education and Workforce Policy (and former Code.org Chief Academic Officer) Pat Yongpradit [2]posted an obituary of sorts for coders . "Computer programmers and software developers are codified differently in the BLS [Bureau of Labor Statistics] data," Yongpradit wrote. "The modern AI-infused world needs less computer programmers (coders) and more software developers (more holistic and higher level). So when folks say that there is less hiring of computer programmers, they are right. But there will be more hiring of software developers, especially those who have adopted an AI-forward mindset and skillset. [...] The number of just pure computer programming roles has already been declining due to reasons like outsourcing, AI will just accelerate the decline."
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> On Wednesday, Yongpradit's colleague Allyson Knox, Senior Director of Education and Workforce Policy at Microsoft, put another AI nail in the coder coffin, testifying before the House Committee on Education -- the Workforce Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary, and Secondary Education on [3]Building an AI-ready America: Teaching in the Age of AI . "Thank you to Chairman Tim Walberg, Ranking Member Bobby Scott, Chair Kevin Kiley, Ranking Member Suzanne Bonamici and members of the Subcommittee for the opportunity to share Microsoft perspective and that of the educators and parents we hear from every day across the country," [4]Knox wrote in a LinkedIn post .
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> "Three themes continue to emerge throughout these discussions: 1. Educators want support to build AI literacy and critical thinking skills. 2. Schools need guidance and guardrails to ensure student data is protected and adults remain in control. 3. Teachers want classroom-ready tools, and a voice in shaping them. If we focus on these priorities, we can help ensure AI expands opportunity for every student across the United States."
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> Yongpradit and Knox report up to Microsoft President Brad Smith, who last July told Code.org CEO Hadi Partovi it was time for the tech-backed nonprofit to [5]"switch hats" from coding to AI as Microsoft announced a new $4 billion initiative to advance AI education. Smith's thoughts on the extraordinary promise of AI in education were cited by Knox in [6]her 2026 Congressional testimony . Interestingly, Knox argued for the importance of computer programming literacy in [7]her 2013 Congressional testimony at a hearing on [8]Our Nation of Builders: Training the Builders of the Future . "Congress needs to come up with fresh ideas on how we can continue to train the next generation of builders, programmers, manufacturers, technicians and entrepreneurs," said Rep. Lee Terry said to open the discussion.
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> So, are reports of computer programming's imminent death greatly exaggerated?
[1] https://slashdot.org/~theodp
[2] https://www.linkedin.com/posts/patyongpradit_linkedin-activity-7432103281989988353-MSJt?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop&rcm=ACoAAAGwTkoBuTtZDbOMlfA66NPuU0-i_GXhd2s
[3] https://democrats-edworkforce.house.gov/hearings/building-an-ai-ready-america-teaching-in-the-ai-age
[4] https://www.linkedin.com/posts/allyson-knox-20811946_aiineducation-educationpolicy-responsibleai-activity-7432503648091267072-xoxq?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop&rcm=ACoAAAGwTkoBuTtZDbOMlfA66NPuU0-i_GXhd2s
[5] https://developers.slashdot.org/story/25/08/10/0110212/hour-of-code-announces-its-now-evolving-into-hour-of-ai
[6] https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2026/02/24/teaching-in-the-ai-age/
[7] https://docs.house.gov/meetings/IF/IF17/20131115/101480/HHRG-113-IF17-Wstate-KnoxA-20131115.PDF
[8] https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CHRG-113hhrg92985/pdf/CHRG-113hhrg92985.pdf
Welcome our new overlords (Score:2)
Yeah, why bother knowing at all how things that we humans invented work?
Re:Welcome our new overlords (Score:4, Insightful)
Seems kind of like asking "why learn arithmetic when you have a calculator?"
Much in the same as math education shouldn't train people to be human calculators.
But this has been the status quo in "programming" for a long time now. If AI changes anything in the long term, it will only change how you solve the problem, with or without a calculator in your hand.
Re: Welcome our new overlords (Score:1)
You know...I can add and subtract but quite frankly I'm out of practice at paper and pencil multiplication and division. And I don't think I was ever taught to take square roots by hand. I can probably manage the recursive method if I had too, but I'd be slow.
I can still do "math" better than most people.
Fast forward ten or twenty years and I could see using ai for code when it's more mature and less borderline retarded with anything harder than scraping a webpage.
Re: (Score:2)
The main issue I see with AI generating code is that it does not understand details, and details matter. It relies heavily on existing code repositories that the model can access. That means the code it might generate has been done already. New and novel code may not be possible. The last time I used AI to generate python code, it did not work. On the surface the code looked right; however, it failed as it used "array(i)" to call a value in an array instead of "array[i]" which is a small but important diffe
Re: (Score:3)
I think you said the magic words: "Fast forward ten or twenty years..." . Maybe then AI becomes a generally reliable tool ... like a screwdriver or bastard. The danger now is that major AI companies have spent SO much money on a flaky product with meager returns to user. Those AI-companies are trying to force LLM results as "correct" ... by definition ... so AI products can be sold that give "correct" results. Like Mao and Stalin, AI-companies argue that not all truths need to
Re: (Score:2)
Whooosh!!!
Re: (Score:3)
why bother knowing at all how things that we humans invented work?
[1]It's not like anyone really knows how AIs work [technologyreview.com]. We'll just let the AIs program the AIs. What could go wrong?
[1] https://www.technologyreview.com/2024/03/04/1089403/large-language-models-amazing-but-nobody-knows-why/?truid=&utm_source=the_algorithm&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=the_algorithm.unpaid.engagement&utm_content=03-04-2024
Re: (Score:3)
Well, the last CPU I truly understood was the 6502. I wrote assembler for it. I knew exactly what it was doing every jiffy. Since then, other than a tiny handful of exceptions, my jobs involved only needing to understand coding to some level of abstraction. One could argue that this is just the next layer of abstraction.
Re: (Score:2)
I think the point is that while there will still need to be some people who understand it, there won't be nearly as many as there are now.
On the one hand, that means a lot of programmers out of a job. On the other hand, it means many more people can create software. Instead of paying someone to make an app implementing business logic, they can do it themselves.
I don't think we are as close as some people fear though. We haven't seen any AI generated apps really hit the mainstream yet. Companies claim to be
nice.... (Score:1)
lets all be in complete ignorance about how the machines we built work.
that will end well.
in other news - AI datacenter breaks down, no one can fix it. whoopsie.
The latest pro-AI talking point... (Score:3, Interesting)
..seems to be that with LLMs doing all the "pointless drudgery" of actually writing code, that this will mean we can actually focus on the bigger picture or architecture while the LLM takes care of the details. Whenever I read this take it makes me think about *actual* architecture. Architects draw building plans. They visualize, plan out, and draw the structure of the house/office/whatever. To do this successfuly, i.e to draw a building that can actually exist in the real world, they have to understand the limits of their building materials. You cannot build a skyscraper out of wood and nails. Architects don't have to be engineers, but they do have to understand the basic contraints of physics and materials. In software engineering, that base understanding of the building blocks comes from *writing code*, lots of it, and *making mistakes*, lots of them, that lead you to an overall understanding of what is and is not possible. Those that gain an understanding pf the details can also become adept at big picture thinking. They understand the role of each component part in holding up the structure and how those components fit together. There's no shortcut to this understanding, and despite what you hear from different AI boosters every single f***ing month, no LLM writes good enough code that you can ignore the details. No, not even Claude or whatever the hype-du-jour is. None of them, and they never will. "Prompt Engineer" is not, and will never be a job title. That's like hiring an architect that doesn't know what a brick is to design your house. The drawing he does is very pretty, but a mild breeze knocks it over on the real world.
Re: (Score:2)
Over the years I've brushed up my AI skills with various classes. One trend I've noticed that I find rather disappointing.. in the earlier classes, you generally started with essentially building a math library. You started with the linear algebra, you build some matrix operation functions, you chained them together, built your layers, and essentially had to construct your networks using, at most, numpy. Then classes started jumping right into tensorflow... I think last class i tried to take I gave up o
Re: (Score:2)
I think there's some confusion between architects and engineers. My father, a structural CE, often complained about architects who drew pictures of stuff that would not stand up. It was a back-and-forth to come up with a design that met architect's intent AND civil engineering. (Note that both could be liable if the building fell down, but that's another discussion...)
But as someone who has been thinking about software/systems architecture "versus" software/systems engineering since about 1990, a key par
Dishonest (Score:2)
Any time a massive company bets heavily on something being true that the public is skeptical about, naturally it has an incentive to claim really loudly that it is true.
Trivial Distinction (Score:2)
In my experience, everyone is at times a systems analyst, a software developer, a code monkey, a qa analyst, heck: even a salesman. It all overlaps.
Continvoucly morging (Score:2)
Is the best thing Microslop AI will teach you.
Buuuuttttt... (Score:3)
they aren't going away entirely, assembly programming jobs aren't dead, they have just been reduced. You still need people that know assembly to fix compilers, you will still need people to read and fix code when AI breaks and we have all seen it break. It will probably break less, but nothing is perfect, especially a black box that no one really understands and can't control.
Developers Must Die (Score:3)
Microsoft then: Our existence, our survival depends on developers.
Microsoft today: Developers must die.
You know I don't remember the last time (Score:2)
Anything really good happened. I mean there are some medical advances but that's tempered by the fact that half the world is currently trying to destroy science for political gain so a lot of those advances aren't going to go anywhere or get to anyone...
Every single day it feels like everything is just falling apart. And this is just one more example of that.
modern AI-infused world needs less computer progra (Score:5, Informative)
Fewer..
Re: (Score:2)
or lesser
the vertical web (Score:2)
[1]https://www.scry.llc/2014/05/1... [scry.llc]
I wrote this 13 years ago, and called the twitter buyout several years before anyone else.
"Saturated industries often consolidate for vertical integration. Large companies buy smaller competitors, and they also purchase their vertical supply chain to reduce costs and manage dependencies. A classic example is the American car industry, which went from 1500 companies to today's Big Three (and the occasional glitch like Tesla)."
yore wakeup call has arrived.
[2]https://www.scry.llc/ [scry.llc]
[1] https://www.scry.llc/2014/05/15/the-vertical-web/
[2] https://www.scry.llc/2025/09/16/cost-of-information/