The sad thing is that AI coding does not have to be done sloppily, but somehow, corporate leadership has pushed us in this direction. They wanted some wins to report to wall street, and they had to sacrifice software quality.

The quality bar for software has been greatly reduced across the board, and normalized slop even outside of the corporate world and into open source software.

I wish for a world where AI coding capabilities still existed, but we did not tolerate slop as a society.

I agree in spirit, but I disagree that implementing once is enough.

I always either cede to temptation to use it (thus nullifying learning) or just get bored so quickly I just turn off the computer

This just sounds like a question of discipline, and AI is likely not the issue.

I can relate. Whenever I wanted to learn programming, it felt like a chore to sit down and do it. This happens when you’re kinda compelled to learn it — such is the case in university.

There is no magic trick. The answer is discipline and fighting your urges. Just tell yourself you’re gonna sit down for 90 minutes or however long, and you will work on X task without using AI (or whatever other guardrails you decide on). When you explicitly tell yourself that, and set up explicit boundaries and guard rails, you will do it. You just keep at it until it works.

As I said earlier, this is how I felt even before AI. After a few months of persistence, it suddenly clicked, seemingly overnight. I became addicted. It became more difficult to stop doing programming. You just need to get in the flow long enough for programming to become natural and enjoyable to your brain.