this post was submitted on 16 May 2024
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Ok but how is anyone meant to know if you generated your docstrings using copilot?
Because they'll be shit?
Docstrings based on the method signature and literal contents of a method or class are completely pointless, and that's all copilot can do. It can't Intuit anything that docstrings are actually there for.
Definitely not my experience. With a well structured code base it can be pretty uncanny. I think it's context is limited to files that are currently opened in the editor, so that may be your issue if you're coding with just one file open?
GitHub Copilot introduced a new keyword a little while ago, "@workspace", where it can see everything in your project. The code it generates uses all your own functions and variables in your libraries and it figures out how to use them correctly.
There was one time where I totally went "WTF", because it spat out Python. In a C++ project. But those kind of hallucinations are getting more and more rare. The more code you write, the better it gets. It really does become sort of like a "Copilot", sitting there coding alongside you. The mistake people make is assuming it's going to come up with ideas and algorithms for them without spending any mental energy at all.
I'm not trying to shill. I'm not a programmer by trade. Just a hobbyist who started on QBasic in the ancient times. But I've been trying to learn it off and on for the past 30 years, and I've never learned so much and had so much fun as in the last 1.5 with AI help. I can just think of stuff to do, and shit will just flow out now.