The landscape of software development is undergoing a profound structural shift as artificial intelligence begins to handle the bulk of production coding. Gergely Orosz (tech industry analyst and former engineer) highlights a growing sentiment among veterans: the "grief" of losing a hard-won craft. For decades, the value of an engineer was tied to their ability to navigate complex codebases and solve logical puzzles manually. That era is ending.

AI models now perform these tasks with greater speed and comparable accuracy, especially in unfamiliar programming languages. This evolution suggests that the classic flow state—the deep immersion achieved while solving difficult logical problems—is being replaced by higher-level architectural thinking. Engineers are becoming directors. They are curators of systems rather than just builders of lines. While this transition significantly increases productivity, it also strips away the visceral satisfaction of building software from scratch.

The economic implications are equally startling. Orosz recently replaced a $120 annual software subscription with a custom tool built in just 20 minutes using an AI model. This shift directly threatens the traditional business model of many software companies. The barrier to creating functional code is vanishing. Consequently, the role of the developer is moving from a builder of individual components to a high-level strategist of complex digital ecosystems.

The way we make computer programs (software development) is changing a lot because Artificial Intelligence (AI) is doing most of the hard work. Experts like Gergely Orosz say that many people who have done this for a long time (veterans) feel a type of sadness (professional grief). For many years, being a great engineer meant being able to solve hard puzzles by hand. Now, that time is ending.

Today, AI models can do these tasks much faster and just as well, even in computer languages the human hasn't learned yet. This means the feeling of being totally focused (flow state) while solving a tricky puzzle is going away. Instead of building every tiny piece, engineers are becoming like movie directors who plan the big picture (architectural thinking). They are now people who choose and organize things (curators) rather than just people writing lines of code. This makes work much faster, but it takes away the fun of building something from the very beginning.

This also changes how money works in the tech world. For example, Orosz replaced a tool that cost $120 every year with a custom one he made using AI in only 20 minutes. This is scary for companies that sell apps you pay for every month (subscription-based software). Since it is now so easy to make code, the job of a developer is no longer about building small parts. Instead, they must be big-picture thinkers (strategists) who manage how all the digital parts work together.