There’s been a lot of chatter lately about the impact of artificial intelligence (A.I.) tools on developer workflows. But how do developers actually feel about these tools? A new survey suggests they’re optimistic about the technology.
Stack Overflow’s latest Developer Survey, which queried 89,184 developers from 185 countries, found that 77 percent of those surveyed had either a favorable or very favorable opinion of A.I. tools for development. Meanwhile, just over three percent seemed to regard the technology in either an unfavorable or very unfavorable light. Check out the full chart:
How will these tools affect developer workflows? Most of those surveyed think an A.I. toolbox will boost their productivity and learning, as well as their efficiency; smaller percentages believe that automation will improve their coding accuracy or collaboration with other team members:
It’s still early days for many of these tools; while A.I.-powered chatbots such as Bard and ChatGPT have gotten better at generating code and debugging, nobody’s ready to entrust these platforms with coding an entire app or service just yet.
As A.I. becomes more sophisticated, it could have an increasing impact on how engineers and developers do their jobs. During a recent episode of ‘Tech Connects,’ Nick Durkin, field CTO of harness.io (where he’s responsible for the organization's worldwide field engineering team, post-sales engineering team, and a portion of product), breaks down how A.I. could end up freeing many tech professionals to focus on more creative tasks, such as designing new features:
There’s also the sad possibility that A.I. could eliminate some tech jobs: According to a recent report by Goldman Sachs, some 29 percent of computer and mathematical jobs are potentially vulnerable to A.I. takeover. The bottom line: whether you like it or not, A.I. is coming, and it’s important to figure out how you’ll integrate it into your current process. Working on your “soft skills” (such as teamwork and communication) as well as your creativity and problem-solving can also help “future proof” your job.
