In the rush to embrace coding assistants like Amazon CodeWhisperer to generate new code for developers, we haven’t spent much time asking if that code is any good. By some measures, the answer is clearly “no.” According to a GitClear analysis, “Code generated during 2023 … resembles [that of] an itinerant contributor,” likely caused by increased use of coding assistants.
This is not to say that coding assistants are bad. They can be incredibly helpful. The issue is we need to invest more time figuring out ways to apply generative AI to tasks like code refactoring now, as covered in a recent Thoughtworks interview. The good news? AI can help, but perhaps not always in the ways we expect.
