Formatted? I guess not really, because it’s trivially easy to reformat it. But how it’s structured, the data structures and algorithms it uses, the way it models the problem space, the way it handles failures? That all matters, because ultimately the computer still has to run the code.

It may be more extreme than what you are suggesting here, but there are definitely people out there who think that code quality no longer matters. I find that viewpoint maddening. I was already of the opinion that the average quality of software is appalling, even before we start talking about generated code. Probably 99% of all CPU cycles today are wasted relative to how fast software could be.

Of course there are trade-offs: we can’t and shouldn’t all be shipping only hand-optimised machine code. But the degree to which we waste these incredible resources is slightly nauseating.

Just because something doesn’t have to be better, it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t strive to make it so.

> Does properly formatted code matter when you no longer have to read it?

That is exactly the moment when you cannot say anything about the code and cannot fix single line by yourself.

I don't agree, I looked at most of the code the AI wrote in my project, I have a good idea of how it is architectured because I actively planned it. If I have a bug in my orders, I know I have to go to the orders service. Then it's not much harder than reading the code my coworkers write at my daily job.

Parent comment implied that they don’t plan to read the code at all in the long term.

At this point in reality do you read assembly or libraries anymore?

Years ago it was Programmer -> Code -> Compile -> Runtime Now today the Programmer is divided into two entities.

Intention/Prompt Engineer -> AI -> Code -> Compile -> Runtime.

We have entered the 'sudo make me a sandwich' world where computers are now doing our bidding via voice and intent. Despite knowing how low level device drivers work I do not care how a file is stored, in what format, or on what medium. I do want it to function with .open and .write which will work as expected with a working instruction set.

Those who can dive deep into software and hardware problems will retain their jobs or find work doing that which AI cannot. The days of requiring an army of six figure polyglots has passed. As for the ability to production or kernel level work is a matter of time.