Bill Pugh

@aarondotdev The study is around if using AI coding assistants helps or hinders skill development, particularly when learning new concepts. It had 52 participants, Junior Engineers. Why are you misrepresenting the study? anthropic.com/research/AI-as…

The Department of Computer Science at UMD (@umdcs) is looking to hire a faculty member who will focus on the impact of AI tools on computer science education. Responsibilities of this faculty position will include taking on a leading role in curriculum innovation and course development related to the challenges and opportunities of AI tools in computer science education, in addition to an appropriate teaching load. umd.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/UMCP/det…

The “we asked it to build a C compiler and two weeks later it was compiling the Linux kernel” story is honestly wild in the best way. What stands out most to me, though, is how fast the required skill set is shifting from “I deeply understand compilers and write the code” to “I don’t fully understand the compiler, but I design the tests, constraints, and verification and then watch the agents work.” It feels like the core of software engineering is moving away from writing every line ourselves and toward owning problem formulation and evaluation, while agents take over more of the implementation in between.

The Adolescence of Technology: an essay on the risks posed by powerful AI to national security, economies and democracy—and how we can defend against them: darioamodei.com/essay/the-adol…

While faculty could afford their own Claude pro licenses (I've gotten one), there are reasons why it would be better to have faculty using university licensed accounts.

Has anyone in a university CS department found a way to provide faculty with access to @Claude Code, other than just having faculty get their own personal Claude Pro license? We could get a Claude Team account through the university, but that requires a premium seat which costs $120/seat/month. UMD students can get free access to Claude Code through the local Claude builders club. UMD DivIT says they are trying to get academic pricing for team/enterprise accounts. If any other university has been successful at that, sharing that information might help UMD follow that path.

New blog post: Don't fall into the anti-AI hype. antirez.com/news/158

Apple: You (Still) Don’t Understand the Vision Pro The first live sporting event was broadcast in the Vision Pro, and it's a big disappointment. The experience could be amazing, but Apple actively ruins it. stratechery.com/2026/apple-you…

We launched Gmail on April Fool’s Day in 2004. 20+ years later, we’re bringing Gmail into the Gemini era. AI Overviews, Suggested personalized replies, Proof read, AI Inbox with new streamlined views and suggested topics to catch-up on and loads more, read the full details here: blog.google/products-and-p…

On the topic of billionaires and wealth taxes in California, I am opposed to wealth taxes because they effectively represent an expropriation of private property and have many unintended and negative consequences that have occurred in every country that has launched such a tax. I am however strongly in favor of a fairer tax system. To that end, it doesn’t seem fair that someone can build a valuable business, create a billion or more in wealth and pay no personal income taxes by living off loans secured by stock in the company, (and even if the loans are unsecured). Apparently, this approach is used by many super wealthy people. A small change in the tax code would address this unfairness. In short, personal loans taken in excess of one’s basis in the stock of a company should be taxable as if you sold the same dollar amount of stock as the loan amount. One shouldn’t be able to live and spend like a billionaire and pay no tax. I welcome arguments to the contrary as to why this is somehow unfair to the billionaire or even the hundred millionaire, but I don’t think there is a good one. The favorable current tax treatment of this approach also encourages the use of leverage which is not good for society. And with respect to California’s budget problem, the issue is not a lack of tax revenues. The problem is how the money is being spent. I have a bunch more ideas on other changes to the tax code that are hard to argue with if anyone cares.

It would be a good time for experts on coding, and especially experts on programming pedagogy, to think about how to train non-programmers to be good vibe coders. What do they need to know about coding practices in order to be more effective? What limits should they understand?

Gruber: Apple employees 'giddy' about Alan Dye’s departure 9to5mac.com/2025/12/04/gru… by @ChanceHMiller

I'm looking at ways to have the UMD CS department provide access to Claude Code for a number of people. I was looking at getting a Claude team account, but according to this document, a standard Claude team account doesn't provide access to Claude Code. Is that right? The premium accounts on a Claude team account provide access, but are _way_ more expensive than an individual pro account. support.claude.com/en/articles/11…

When former Harvard President Lawrence H. Summers was pursuing a romantic relationship with a woman he described as a mentee, he turned to a longtime associate for guidance: Jeffrey E. Epstein. @dhruvtkpatel and @camsrivastava report. thecrimson.com/article/2025/1…

On a Saturday night I stumbled across something on the internet that made me feel like ****** my pants. A giant dataset of real surveillance operations targeting 1000s of people across nearly every country. Unraveling it and the mysterious company behind it has consumed 1.5 years

BREAKING: Look at this. A new crypto wallet was created on Friday. It literally started shorting the market, with Bitcoin and Etherum shorts, JUST BEFORE Trump posted about tariffs. It last short was placed at 4:49 PM EST. Trump posted at 4:50PM EST. It made nearly $200 million in profits. Unusual.

Autonomous AI Hacking and the Future of Cybersecurity schneier.com/blog/archives/…

Vibe coding is irresponsibly building software through dice rolls, not caring what code is produced What about when engineers at the top of their game use AI tools responsibly to accelerate their work? I propose "vibe engineering"!

Not many people know this, but the iPhone 17's selfie sensor is not actually square but octagonal. This may explain why we can't use the full 24MP resolution of the sensor and take super-wide square images. I suspect this is done because the optics simply aren't big enough to resolve details in the corners without distortion and vignetting. The extra space of the octagon outside of the centre square is probably used for electronic image stabilisation for now.

It's not just unit tests - there are so many other top tier software engineering practices that accelerate productivity with coding agents Automated tests, comprehensive documentation, good version control habits, a culture of code review, quick deploy to staging environments...