You're viewing the assemblag.es public feed.

Federated feed Local feed

cthos 🐱cthos@mastodon.cthos.dev
Sep 29, 2026, 11:25 PM
"These things are good at generating code" is a phrase that makes me think that you do not review the output of the code generating hell machine.
For example, Muse's had a shell script who's usage example is (working from memory of @jonny 's thread) `print_home_dir.sh <default home dir>` that was literally just an `echo /hard/coded/dir`...which is just consumed by several other shell scripts in the environment, and included a big "AND NOTHING ELSE" in it. It's peak stupid.
💬 2🔄 1⭐ 3

Replies

cthos 🐱cthos@mastodon.cthos.dev
Sep 29, 2026, 11:28 PM
I have seen examples where it did something akin to:
`let string = "this-is-a-string".replace(" ", "-")` complete with hard coded string and a replacement that'd never replace anything. Is the string the correct output? Sure? What's that replace doing there?
(Edit: This was during a code review I was obliged to perform, I do not prompt the slop machine myself)
💬 0🔄 0⭐ 2
Epic NullEpic_Null@infosec.exchange
Sep 30, 2026, 4:25 AM
@cthos @jonny I
But
you can just
echo ~
I can't -
💬 0🔄 0⭐ 2
cthos 🐱cthos@mastodon.cthos.dev
Sep 30, 2026, 4:27 AM
@Epic_Null @jonny Or presumably any of the environment variables that should be set indicating the user's home directory, or not have that shell script at all, or, or....
/me covers head with arms.
💬 1🔄 0⭐ 1
cthos 🐱cthos@mastodon.cthos.dev
Sep 30, 2026, 4:30 AM
@Epic_Null @jonny You know I'm a little surprised the thing didn't just `cat /etc/passwd | awk ...`, that'd have been fun and secure and maintainable, right?
💬 0🔄 0⭐ 0
Epic NullEpic_Null@infosec.exchange
Sep 30, 2026, 4:33 AM
@cthos @jonny How even doi you find "several other shell scripts" of use from this???? It's an ECHO script!!! For a HARD CODED value!!! It's one of those things you should ever grab like... once? Like MAYBE you put the value in a big "Welcome" message? but after that??? why????
💬 0🔄 0⭐ 2
Violet Maddervioletmadder@kolektiva.social
Sep 30, 2026, 6:27 AM
@Epic_Null @cthos @jonny
Hey, hey now. These things really are extremely good at generating code.
It's just that ain't at all the same thing as being good at generating GOOD code.
💬 1🔄 0⭐ 0
cthos 🐱cthos@mastodon.cthos.dev
Sep 30, 2026, 2:05 PM
@violetmadder @Epic_Null @jonny It is certainly code-shaped, I'll give them that
💬 1🔄 0⭐ 0
Violet Maddervioletmadder@kolektiva.social
Sep 30, 2026, 8:20 PM
@cthos @Epic_Null @jonny
Which, honestly, might be the worst thing about it.
You know, like how the worst thing about a prion is that it's brain-protein shaped.
💬 0🔄 0⭐ 0