Ask HN: What should developers focus on now that AI can do a lot of coding?

Writing code was never the issue. Writing good code was. By "good", I mean that it is understandable by the human that will need to debug/maintain/extend it.

AIs on their own don't produce good code. If your AI makes you more productive on your way to write good code (just like syntax highlighting or other tools already do), then why not (ignoring the carbon footprint of course).

But if you're in the business of writing good code, AIs are not replacing you right now.

Even before AI came on the scene as early as 2016 I saw that programming was becoming an undifferentiated commodity whether it was web development, full stack development, mobile, etc.

Unless you were doing something extremely specialized and that comp was plateauing in most tier 2 cities doing enterprise corporate dev that most developers do.

I started focusing on system design, organizational change strategy, cloud, and becoming more involved with how technology can be used to bring business value.

I am not saying “learn cloud”. That’s table stakes and not a differentiator. I’m saying learn something well enough to be strategic and not just a ticket taker.

If you look at the leveling guidelines of any tech company, you don’t get passed a mid level IC based on “I codez real gud”. It’s based on scope, impact and dealing with ambiguity. It might be phrased a different way. But it all boils fish to that.