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Comment by j_m_b | Hacker News Reader

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j_m_b

That's what is nice about LLMs. You CAN do these things now!

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Maybe I'm out of touch with the times, but I wouldn't feel safe riding an e-scooter with custom vibe coded firmware.

If it is coded in safe Rust, why not ?

Safe rust does not mean correct logic; best not conflate the two.

You could have perfectly safe rust that disables brakes above a certain speed, inverts steering by wire, or adjusts the charging parameters, for example (depending on addressable capabilities).

I meant something deeper.

You don't have to fully vibe code it. Most of this stuff doesn't take massive brains, it is just super tedious - especially the reverse engineering. I've never really had the patience for that (except one USB devices that I did reverse engineer when I was younger). AI really helps with the tedium.

What make you think it is vibe coded? There is no mention of genAI being used, and the methodology looks more consistent with hand-written code he actually understands.

What makes you think the original wasn't vibe coded?!

The firmware on these things is terrible, also larger e-mopeds btw. Like a 2 second delay on the throttle after breaking (fun when cornering!). Happy this Egret GT E-Scooter didnt turn into..’Regret’

I was replying to j_m_b's comment, not the article. But you're right, the article doesn't sound like they vibe coded it.

I'd be pretty careful with this kind of thing. My friend vibe coded something similar and it had some very unexpected real world bugs like instantly locking the engine, cranking the engine to 100 in a second and burning the motor out, etc. So something like an escooter that you might ride across a busy road may not be the best use of vibe coding.

You can use an LLM but you have the provide the spec of the motor and the surrounding hardware apparatus. Not every motor is the same.

No, you can’t. Just because you can pull the lever on an LLM enough times and get something that works doesn’t mean you’ve done the work. Doing the work implies learning and transferable skills, none of which you get by prompting an LLM.

Yes they can. At the end of the day, whether the food was made in a microwave oven or by a Michelin starred chef, the user is fed. Doing the work means that the work happened. Anything else is secondary.

A large part of this project was my personal learning. Ultimately I didn't improve the functionality of the device by a large margin; instead I learned a lot about how these devices are built. If I'd let Claude write replacent firmware it would've all been for naught.

Apologies for hijacking this comment, but if you have any interest in doing this sort of work full-time I may have a job for you. This project is awesome.

You wouldn't call someone who puts food in a microwave a chef, would you? And you wouldn't say that putting food in the microwave is the same thing as cooking a Michelin star meal. These are different things.

How they meant "you": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generic_you

How you meant "you": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deixis#Personal

I have a hunch this is not lost on you though, and you're doing this performatively.

Please stop. It is beyond tiresome, and it is not going to compel anybody. On the contrary, it is a great way to induce animosity.

I assure you that what you're describing is lost on no one either; rather, unlike you, plenty of people simply do not care, and find this distinction trite at best. Especially when presented this way.

> I have a hunch this is not lost on you though, and you're doing this performatively.

Uh, duh? I’m trying to draw a distinction that the person isn’t doing the work, the LLM is.

> On the contrary, it is a great way to induce animosity.

Sorry, what had you under the impression I was trying to make friends? When people who suck show up to your spot, you make them go away by making it clear they’re not welcome.

What if you're the one that sucks?

Then we can agree to disagree :)

> Sorry, what had you under the impression I was trying to make friends?

Why, are you here to make enemies instead? If not, and heaven forbid there's a space between the two, this should apply:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooperative_principle

Or do you really need to be explained the point of civility?

> When people who suck show up to your spot, you make them go away by making it clear they’re not welcome.

Except you were not making things clear. On the contrary, you were pretending that there was ambiguity in their words, which arguably only complicated things. This is a very cowardly and sly way to make any point.

Mind you, for the unwelcome people, the downvote and flag buttons are the way to go. Comments are for conversation.

I’m not interested in being civil with people who actually believe using LLMs give you skills. The same way I’m not interested in being civil with homophobes and flat-earthers.

A microwave just cooks your input ingredients and if you use non microwave safe containers or food that is not suitable for it, you get edible but hazardous food.

Garbage in, Garbage out. There are minimum expectations on user like ability to source proper materials, use them correctly and an ability to verify/check the result for problems. More important if it's something you want to eat or ride!

So you're still not brainy enough to do it, but the LLM can.

I mean. Sort of? The LLM won't go into checking random USB-C connections with an oscilloscope - it doesn't have hands, for one.

You could give it some robot hands if you felt so much inclined

FdCAN or Bx?

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