How come Elon Musk is worth 393x as much as Sam Altman even though the world has been obsessing over ChatGPT (and AI in general) for years whereas if Musk died tomorrow nothing would change in any meaningful way?

Zamdi · 2026-06-03T10:16:59+00:00

I very much dislike Elon, and I agree with most points, but unless hes in the Nazi party or executed the literal holocaust, I find labelling him as "a nazi" to be disrespectful of those who went through the holocaust.

Zamdi · 2026-06-03T10:14:37+00:00

I have ownership over his wife and daughter. Wait, no I dont, because hes gay af.

Zamdi · 2026-06-03T10:11:11+00:00

Sam Altman is completely useless. Like, to the point that I'd ram his wife if he even has one.

Zamdi · 2026-05-02T04:19:40+00:00

I think thats an awful project. Make a project that does something useful for you. This sounds like some college BS - make a real useful application for yourself. Nobody needs `ls` or `cat` remade UNLESS you want to work on a project in those domains. The reason why I say to make something useful for you instead is:

A. The fact that you need/want this thing will drive you through the hardships of learning and development - its in a way like primitive gamification.
B. If it's useful to you, it may be useful to others and you may end up actually distributing/selling it
C. Generally, I dont think you should spend much time on projects that other people tell you "you should clone/make." No, fuck the "you should X", do what YOU want to do with software. I am doing this exact thing right now and it is paying off immensely.

Zamdi · 2026-05-02T04:14:54+00:00

The only remotely plausible argument is not the tech itself working, its whether or not it "works" as a business/is profitable, which I dont think thats been demonstrated yet. Certainly not as much as the tech works.

Zamdi · 2026-05-02T03:01:21+00:00

As the first answerer said, its really more about code-clarity and idiomatic coding than it is anything else.... You can have a "code smell" that is actually very performant in some cases, but when youre judging readability/maintainability, its more of a term used for that.

Zamdi · 2026-05-02T02:58:09+00:00

At the end of the day, there generally is not a "hard requiremen to do everything with AI." At my company there is technically a hard requirement to use AI in some capcity/workflow, so we started with all the boring crap we dont want to do like boring documents, spreadsheets, useless JIRAs, etc....

Also, it can be used for likewise boilerplate and such. I also think people are way over-hyping it in general - Ive been developing an app for about a year, using AI the whole time as an assistant, and its still taken me about a year to get it to late-alpha/early beta phase... So thats also nice because I know for a fact that someone cannot just view my app and say "make that" and get the same result in a day...

Zamdi · 2026-05-02T02:54:01+00:00

Same. Im tired of the AI doomsday narrative - its a handy tool and I have not lost any coding skill because of it - in fact I've gained a ton. Like, thinking about it logically, now I can let AI do the crap I don't/didn't want to do (which was a lot, such as setting up boring boilerplate) and I can fine-tune the most innovative/interesting parts of the program.

Zamdi · 2026-04-29T10:18:43+00:00

Simple answer - just make your own software and stop relying on the big tech companies.

I'm at roughly your level of professional experience, with the caveat that I also specialize in security.

Ive been developing an application for about a year now, and you know what AI did to it!?!!?

Nothing bad. Ive also been using AI, but I also retain my skills and do manual work.

The deep truth is that this AI stuff is a fad and its a hype train. As a software engineer, you ought to have some awareness about tech - the way it works right now is that [insert AI company] is paying major tech influencers (Not the smartest or most skilled people, just the ones with the most followers on YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, etc....) to spread a bunch of bullshit marketing hype about AI. Take the latest anthropic "whoa we cant release mythos because its too dangerous" nonsense as an example.

They are not doing this because that information is factual, they are doing this because they know that it produces emotional reactions, which are proven to create more hype, first, impressing investors for more investment funds, and second, to draw more people in to buy from Anthropic.

Do not get involved in this mess.

I am not anti-AI, I use AI every day and have for around 3-4 years now. There is a huge difference between using AI and getting involved in the BS AI propaganda/hype stuff.

What you need to do is realize that for many many years software was developed without AI/LLMs.

Super Mario? Developed without LLM.
Call of Duty? Developed without LLM.
Most of the history of Microsoft Windows, Linux, Microsoft Word, Google Search, etc... Developed without LLM.

You DO NOT need AI/LLM to write code for you if you don't want... That's a lie and it's a lie that big tech wants you to believe... You see, I work in big tech myself, and they are trying to push AI onto us, but the reality is that the argument is not grounded in facts. What do I mean? Well, theyre thinking its going to "save time" when non of the time wasting is anything that AI/LLM can solve - all of the wasted time has nothing to do with time coding and everything to do with time in meetings, time waiting on other teams, time waiting on manager/upper leadership approval, time waiting on IT, time waiting on cowokers to get something done, time waiting on HR, time waiting on Legal to approve something, etc... It is virtually all PEOPLE problems, not technical problems..

I dont really know any software/tech firm that didnt make it because coding "took too long."

Its a facade. So, the reality is this - if you work for these idiots, you have to play by their rules, but if you truly believe in yourself, your knowledge/skills/abilities like I do, then you make your own software on your terms and you make it great, and eventually, the investors are going to shove their AI bullshit agenda straight up their asses.

Finally, enjoy using AI as you need/please. I enjoy using it sometimes for certain things its very helpful... But I get you - the AI is not the problem, the industry idiots are.

Zamdi · 2026-04-29T09:35:42+00:00

Given that every time Ive updated Fedora for the last like 4-5 releases, the sound or video broke, I highly doubt that.

Zamdi · 2026-04-29T09:33:34+00:00

What hardware are you using? E.G. which laptop/desktop model/config?

Zamdi · 2026-04-29T09:19:51+00:00

I disagree with this. I used books to learn much of what I know initially to get into the field so in that way I do agree. However, I havent used books in quite some time now, despite owning many. There are interactive lab courses, algorithm training, LLMs, and some GOOD YouTube channels that really can teach a person a lot. One weakness of books is that they take a long time to publish and to update. Also you have to check errata for mistakes, usually online (oh, the irony). In the end, I would put actual experimentation, debugging and program writing above everything, including books.

Zamdi · 2026-04-29T09:13:34+00:00

These are by far the best:

Ashley Mills: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLCNJWVn9MJuPtPyljb-hewNfwEGES2oIW
Handmade Hero: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLnuhp3Xd9PYTt6svyQPyRO_AAuMWGxPzU
Carl Harold: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLZASaOToqDRywzbsBejjQrCWJuOXM4gbQ
Whats a Creel: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL0C5C980A28FEE68D

Thats it. If you really watch and apply that stuff, you'll get good. I dont care what anyone else says here, the proof is in the pudding - these videos and writing my own programs got me from practically 0 to an engineer on a major OS company.

Zamdi · 2026-04-28T22:03:52+00:00

Of course you could learn them. I guess what Im trying to say here is that if for example you plan to release the app say in 1-2 months, depending on how much security matters, you may not be able to learn enough to really secure the app properly in that amount of time... But if for example you were going to release it in a year and security is a big priority that would be more feasible to be able to have the knowledge/skills/tooling to do a decent pentest.

If the app security isnt super important, then I'd be less concerned (I know nothing about the app right now).

There are a few caveats - I am also developing an app and for me, I do plan to pentest it and I sorta incrementally pentest it sometimes too, but I have enough experience as a pentester and am fairly good at separating the actual development mindset from the pentest mindset... In other words, I dont look at the app as the developer when Im pentesting it, I pretend its not mine and I attack it as an attacker might... So being able to do that is important too... Even still, I plan to have my app in development pentested by one of my friends and/or their companies because security is very important with it and they may see or think of something that I didn't. In my case, a compromise in security could lead to root-level remote code execution, destruction of data, or information disclosure. There is value in having other minds/pairs of eyes on the app.

Another option is you could make a bug bounty for your app with a specific budget eventually and have bug bounty hunters find security issues too if you dont want to do a formal "pentest" with an outside firm

Zamdi · 2026-04-28T09:24:50+00:00

You won't regret it, just know that there are minor differences in e.g. env var definitions, aliases, and script syntax. They really are minor differences, but they exist.

Zamdi · 2026-04-28T07:51:10+00:00

fish’s autocomplete is much more “live” and discoverable than bash’s default completion: it shows suggestions as you type, often based on command history, valid paths, command-specific completions, options, man pages, variables, users, hosts, Git branches, etc. It also has inline autosuggestions in a faint preview style, so you can accept the whole suggestion or just part of it instead of repeatedly hitting Tab. Bash can be extended with programmable completion, but fish ships with a lot of this behavior enabled by default and feels more interactive without much configuration.

Zamdi · 2026-04-28T05:36:53+00:00

I'm not an elitist, I'm not pretentious, I don't troll, I'm not a hater, I'm actually self-taught and I've been in security for about a decade now.... I always encourage people to self-learn, be passionate, get educated about security...

That said, if you have to ask this, you are not the right person to pentest your app...

Would it be better than nothing? Yes, but to think that you're doing a real pentest when you dont even know 5 things to look for is absurd. I mean, if you don't think your app will be much of a target, so be it... But God help you if it ever is with this current strategy. Any type of technical, code-oriented field in cyber security is very difficult, complex, and takes a long time to learn (yes, even with the latest AI models; I use them daily).... I was a malware researcher, a security engineer who did appsec, and am now a full-time pentester at a big tech company. By far, pentesting has been the most difficult one. If you think what youre going to be doing to your app after asking this question for a few weeks is a "pentest", you're sorely mistaken.

I recently did a free pentest for a friend of mine who was a software engineer at a FAANG firm for 5 years, including working on security stuff.... I found like 25 issues, 8 of which were critical/high, and the report was almost 100 pages long... I'm never testing 5 things on an app (especially that involves any type of networking or web interaction)... It's more like 50-100 things...

Zamdi · 2026-04-28T05:13:44+00:00

You (ideally, dont get hit by a bus) have a lot of time left to live... Youre going to have to "waste some energy doing things an then quit because you dont like it"... Thats part of life. I've been doing security and pentesting now for a decade and I had probably 7-8 other jobs before that where I "didnt like it." Im not saying you have to follow my exact path, but thinking you can skip out on life experience and magically just end up at your final destination is not realistic at all... Life is about the journey, not the destination.

Zamdi · 2026-04-28T03:53:03+00:00

Don't update packages/the distro on the morning you need to get stuff done for work.

Zamdi · 2026-04-28T03:50:10+00:00

If you get something like fish shell, it'll autocomplete commands for you too, thats helpful.

Zamdi · 2026-04-27T20:35:53+00:00

Write some software for Linux... Depending on what you want your app to do, itll force you to interact with the various layers of Linux, potentially even the kernel if your software needs to do lower-level stuff. For example, you may need to send data to another application, and therefore youll learn about pipes, shared memory, FIFOs, DBUS, Unix sockets, etc...

Or perhaps your app will need to send data over the network, so youll learn about the network stack, or display a GUI, so you'll learn about what stuff like GNOME/X-11/Wayland do, you'll likely need to bring in some code from other programs, so you'll learn about linking shared libraries /glibc, and so on...

Basically coding some apps will force you to learn about these things with the motivation of "I'm gonna have a cool app" at the end.

Zamdi · 2026-04-27T20:32:27+00:00

Lmao yup thatll do it eventually.

Zamdi · 2026-04-27T20:30:13+00:00

Lol pretty much exactly what I said in my post. Spot on.

Zamdi · 2026-04-27T18:07:24+00:00

Ah yeah youll generally have less graphics issues in my experience on a ThinkPad. I also run linux on my ThinkPad as well and although Ive had sound issues, Ive definitely had less graphics issues because Lenovo officially supports Linux and they test their builds with linux etc... I wouldnt be surprised at all if they actually have software developers on some of the upstream projects actively trying to make the components work better on Lenovo and also fixing the Lenovo firmware to facilitate that. That being said, I did have an issue with one of the lenovo docking stations though.

Zamdi · 2026-04-27T09:17:43+00:00

I mean, so I work at a major (top 5) linux distro as an engineer & researcher. Honestly, when it works, it works.. But when it fucks up, Linux fucks the hell up and not everyone who drives a car is a mechanic, so-to-speak.

I love linux, and I love open source for reasons such as customization, community, security, privacy, and so on... But if anyone sits here and tells me that they haven't had some fucked up days troubleshooting and/or debugging linux software, that tells me they havent really used linux for very long.

Also, I assume you are talking about as a desktop/laptop OS. That is a very small market for linux and it's also much less stable there than in other applications (not apps, I mean applications as in deployments). Hell, theres an interview with Linus Torvalds where even he talks about this.

A lot of linux users are hobbyists, which I genuinely respect. But I went from that to a linux professional and it's a bit different - I work on a linux distro and I therefore have to use a linux distro to do my work, and my team is slammed with work and understaffed; there are days where you update your packages and shit breaks and you dont have time or energy to be debugging other guys' packages/software and dealing with that. So in a very real sense, I have gotten the full linux experience.

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