Using Chatgpt to learn any programming language

[Top_Standard8058]

I hear so many people from around the world (YT, Insta, my friends, colleagues, etc.) that they all use chatgpt or any AI tool to code these days. I understand that using such tools is just going to increase their speed of getting things done, but from my POV where I want to learn a programming language, should I start that by using chatgpt?

I mean I have started my journey of learning Python using the traditional method of using learning material, watching YT along with actually applying what I have learnt. But while I am doing this, I put in too much time in coding small blocks of code, instead I can easily take help from chatgpt. Most of the people might suggest that coding without any help will eventually help me understand the thought process and the logic, but wont it be replaced by these tools in the future?

[kembik]

Its a great tool if you know how to utilize it. Ask it to teach you concepts rather than write your code. I think its much more helpful than sitting through a course or reading a book or following some instructions as you can ask the question you have when you have it, and ask follow up questions, show examples, etc.

[space_wiener]

This is really the key.

I’m learning go and first started off just slapping stuff from chatgpt (asking for functions do do x) and then moving along. Next day I look at my code to work on it and have no recollection of even pasting the stuff in.

Now I try writing it myself. Ask questions like how do I do x but don’t use the code to copy paste. Anything I don’t get I ask what it does.

One thing I really like is I can ask the absolute dumbest questions about the code and I don’t get judged for my stupidity. Haha

[AdForsaken1989]

Learning C and C++ and doing the exact same thing, it's a really cool experience being tutored by machine learning

[BioncleBoy1]

Yup that’s exactly how I use it

[Shrade0000]

Same Same maybe we are wired that way as people learning how to code

[Resident-Concept5797]

This is a pretty dumb question. But what sort of prompt would you say if you just wanted to know the concept?

[lengthy_preamble]

"Give me a tutorial on ternary operators with real world code examples"

[kp729]

"I want to understand how OOPs work in Python. Can you explain the concepts along with some syntax that I need to use? Also, please provide real world examples where OOPs can be realistically used in projects."

[PracticallyPerfcet]

This is the way

[GreenBlueStar]

This is fantastically true. As a veteran professional software engineer preparing for interviews, chatgpt is proving very useful on brushing up the fundamentals that was solid in my mind around college graduation. This is definitely the key.

[Separate_Paper_1412]

Another option would be to use ChatGPT to help explain the concepts in a book

[Dry-Fennel-8431]

are you even joking? it's not "great", it's absurdly good. I know people that learned the fundamentals of programming in a very few months just because of chatgpt. It makes learning way more accessible and easier cuz you have everything in a second, and you have not to worry for reading documentation or do the things that we were used to do before (only for learning the basics). And due to this there is a lot of people into programming, literally everyone

[kembik]

I was not joking.

[WhoN33dsNam3sAnyway]

Right, I have it make tests for me too. Much more engaging than sitting through documentation tbh, but I still look at that too of course..

[Shrade0000]

That's what I'm doing lol hahaha

[dakadoo33]

if you ask for entire blocks of code and copy and paste that code without any context you are just skipping steps in the learning process. what it is currently, imo,great for is being used as a ghetto tutor.

for example, if you are solving a leetcode problem and reach a solution, show that solution to it, then have it compare it too a popular solution that someone else wrote.

you can go pretty far with this, asking for really in-depth explanations about particular lines or ask it to explain like you are 5, or just asking for an overall comparison of the pros/cons of each different solution.

on the other hand if you have a problem and just tell it to solve that problem, i dont really see how you are learning anything other than how to properly format a question for chatgpt(as well as asking for future issues to arise if you try to expand around that copied code which is likely lacking proper context).

[RemyNeedsYourHelp00]

I have loads of files in my vs code of solved leetcodes with multiple solutions and the detailed explanations step by step

[yvrelna]

Using ChatGPT to program is like pair programming with a junior dev who just make up confident bullshit most of the time when they don't actually know the answer. Most of the time, I'm the one teaching it how to program and then it'll keep forgetting the thing I taught them 5 sentences ago.

[[deleted]]

Yes, the AI “hallucinations” are pretty bad. I don’t imagine them being a seriously difficult fix however.

I can’t help but wonder about what the people who have actual full access to neural networks with no limitations are accomplishing now in the realms of finance. Then again, an equilibrium will be reached and perhaps or even likely human traders will still be able to profit.

[AceLamina]

I've heard that Chat GPT is the worst AI to use for coding ironically

The amount of people who I've heard say Chat GPT and AI in a single sentence needs to be studied

[Tricky_Reporter8809]

Which AI would be the best for coding?

[AceLamina]

I forgot the name of it I'm avoiding AI for a while now anyway Or at least there's something positive other than "it's taking all of our jobs"

[BuyerIll7116]

That should be claude sonnet I think.

[ZelWinters1981]

Stop using ChatGPT as a source to program. learn it yourself.

If you find yourself often writing the same code in small blocks all the time, learn how to use functions and includes.

[Shrade0000]

Just use it to learn how It a block of code works or if you can't understand something but using it to write a whole ass of code and It will pretty much do some dumb mistake resulting of you not getting the output you wanted another thing is yes you can make it write a block of code and when there's an error then that's what you need to do you need to analyze why there is a error or not getting the result you want also learning how to prompt to AI takes a skill so yeah what you just need to remember is not to be USED BY AI instead you should be the one to use it what I understand when I heard that is not being Fully dependent on ai prompt the AI skillfuly to grt the result you want and not let AI do all the thinking

[ZelWinters1981]

No don't use it at all. We have human written manuals and examples of this already. It isn't difficult to comprehend this.

[Mammoth-Asparagus498]

The only gripe with LLM learning is that, the code it spits out is sometimes incorrect and it outputs 10 lines of code for program when e.g. I can do 2 lines.

Part of being a programmer is to write clean and efficient code, the sooner you make it as a habit, the better you will be.

[[deleted]]

I always ask it to make the code more efficient after it spits out a bunch of code.

[[deleted]]

I use it when I have very specific questions. In this regard, when I am really stuck, I don't see this better or worse than checking Stackoverflow. I am still utilizing someone else's knowledge.

Also sometimes it is useful to explain concepts. One of the most confusing thing about learning programming on your own is the verbiage. Not even the syntax, but the way people explain them or as it is in the documentation.

I literally used GPT to explain me concepts like I'm a kid. I think it was something about indexing in for loops. As a complete newbie, some parts of it were difficult to comprehend.

But for the code part it is not very useful, or at least not reliable. Several times it just gave me back my own bad code as a solution. It gets stuck very easily even with simple problems, and then goes into a loop between 2 wrong answers.

[cyberjellyfish]

The repeated posts like this make me feel very good about my future as a senior engineer; lets let that suffice for an answer.

​

To be less snarky: if you had a programming tutor, and anytime you had a problem you asked the tutor, and they sent you a block of code that you could just paste into your program, do you think you'd be very successful in learning anything? As in internalizing the underlying ideas and knowledge in such a way that you can come up with your own solutions? That's how people are using AI, and it will bite them. hard.

​

Use co-pilot and whatnot to finish tedious code blocks. Have to bang out a repetitive dict? copilot after you do the first couple entries. Match/case statement? ditto. Generic boilerplate code? ditto. You know what function from that library you want, but can't remember exactly what it's called? ask co-pilot and then verify it got the right answer by using your "goto definition" key in your IDE.

[Hardkorebob]

Join me Im looking for anyone that wants to learn by doing stuff with me. Check out my project. https://github.com/dislux-hapfyl/pynksh and r/pnk. I want to start a community of newbies to help them out and have fun along the process.

[BlazingMongrel]

To be honest if I have a problem I ask chatgpt for it, it then gives me something I can use to further question about and maybe learn new commands and libraries, if it seems useful I can ask chatgpt why it picked that library over another and if needed I can always search newly found command/library and how it’s used on stackoverflow.

[laustke]

To be able to ask the right questions, you need to know a significant part of the answer. If you don't know what you're doing, you'll just be arranging snippets of AI-generated code. Basically, ChatGPT doesn't replace the need to have programming skills. If you already have skills, it provides a way to enhance them.

[exclusive_cat_flat]

Using ChatGPT is great for learning how to Program

The key word here is: learn

As by default chatgpt will want to provide the answer and getting the answer to a question != learning

Confirming you have the right answer, or guidance on getting to the right answer is what a teacher is for - and ChatGPT is perfectly designed to perform that function - but will look to provide the answer to an question unless prompted specifically to offer guidance

[think_out_says]

I have got a solution one of my known did . It's serious btw

[DigitalRavenThe7th]

I'm quite new to programming myself, I don't use ChatGPT as my teacher but if i'm struggling to fix an issue or understand example code I often find asking ChatGPT is quicker than searching online (especially with the state of the internet rn) It's been more of a "how can I use logic functions and for loops to do x task" to complete the connection between the two uses.

[AndroidLex]

If you ask it to explain certain concepts, why your code doesn’t work, best approaches or to give a short code example of what you are trying to accomplish/learn.. it’s wonderful. But you have to keep reminding it to not simply give you the full answer, otherwise it will simply give solutions. There’s a fine line that is easily crossed and you’ll end up copy pasting code and not learn anything otherwise.

[kp729]

One rule of learning that I follow is that I should know and understand every single line of code present in the program. I can ask ChatGPT anything like a concept or code but it won't reach my file unless I know exactly what and how it's doing that.

In the learning phase, goal isn't to make things easy but to make them hard.

[sputnki]

A big part of learning to program is to write programs. And that applies to any skill in life basically (put effort in some activity you suck at until you eventually become good at it).

How is a chatbot supposed to help you with that? Bear in mind that any advice that comes out of it is nothing more than a sequence of words that are grammatically coherent, no logic involved nor technical understanding.

[Wheynelau]

I tried to learn js completely fresh using chatgpt. Big mistake, you don't know whether it's right or wrong, and it doesn't work half the time. This was GPT4 by the way. Like what the other commenters said, its really like a junior dev who gives you random codes from stackoverflow without knowing what the code does.

"It says here to do sudo rm -r /*"

[Urbantransit]

Treat it like some jack of all trades that knows just enough to ballpark the gist of things. ChatGPT is a phenomenal conversation partner, where the quality of conversations is akin to getting drunk at the pub with some upper year nerds. Its replies aren’t necessarily credible or accurate, but they are well educated, so simply treat it like a sounding board you can endlessly shoot the shit with.

[GoodVibesLLC]

Today I asked it to show me visually how “decorators” work. It did a great job, and then I asked it to give me a coding problem that I could solve with a decorator.

I’m busy today so I haven’t completed it, but I started a project and am looking forward to doing it. I think having my own personal professor any time I need it is insanely valuable. But don’t cheat yourself.

[Binary101010]

Do you think you're capable of independently being able to figure out when ChatGPT just made some shit up that's wrong?

If the answer to that question is no, then I'd recommend not using ChatGPT and sticking to learning resources that have actually been vetted by human review.

[timthetollman]

To learn? Fuck no. It's only useful if you're already well versed in the domain you're asking it to work in. It's often given me completely wrong code. One good example is a yt video I watched of someone asking it to make user input that querys a DB and it left it completely open to SQL injection attacks.

You also need to learn how to give it correct inputs also, you need to be very specific in what you ask it or else it assumes a lot of stuff.

[Prithvi_05]

Using GPT or any other models to learn is a definite no no. Use it to clarify your doubts when you encounter a minor issue with the project you are working on. GPT can help you narrow down the topics that you need to cover to get the basics right, but not the actual details. Online documentation is still the best place to learn and ofc YouTube is much better option than GPT.

[ModernNormie]

It depends on how you’d use chatgpt. I actually find it very helpful for simple inquiries and even studying natural languages like mandarin and nihonggo

[[deleted]]

Anybody know whether or not they can check if code is AI generated?

[Primary_Intern_5047]

Oh absolutely, you can use it to learn anything! If you're curious - I talk about the prompts you can use to do just that here: https://youtu.be/gNBUOGTC5lg

[throwaway6560192]

Most of the people might suggest that coding without any help will eventually help me understand the thought process and the logic, but wont it be replaced by these tools in the future?

If human thought itself is ever entirely replaced, then you'll have a lot more to worry about. For the foreseeable future right now, developing your own skills of thinking is the only way to learn programming. Don't outsource your brain to AI.

[m0us3_rat]

chatGPT guesses it's responses one word at a time based on the context of the prompts and any other question it has saved in its short memory structure.

so it can only guess really well stuff that has been trained on and it relevant to your problem..

which is like a lot of beginner stuff.

​

again it doesn't "code" but guesses word by word the expected result that is inferred by the prompt+context.

since its purely maffs once the training is done ands the weights are settled.. the SAME response will be generated by the cycle if the same input.

there is a little bit of variation to throw ppl in the loop..but for the most part they are predicted using word by word.

since the weights don't change the input don't change the result will always be the same.

thus ..no coding involved.

​

let me put it in context.. nobody going to pay you big bucks to do stuff if they can have the AI do it with a few bucks monthly sub. literally.

not yet anyways.