"Don’t Learn To Code" Is Wrong Says CEO Of Github

Under the leadership of CEO Thomas Dohmke, GitHub’s Copilot has become a flagship example of how generative AI can radically improve developer productivity by suggesting code in real time, automating repetitive tasks, and reducing time spent on boilerplate. It’s been described as “autocomplete on steroids,” and has sparked a wave of innovation across developer tools and enterprise software.

Coding as a Core Curriculum

In a recent podcast by Entrepreneurship & Opportunities, he strongly emphasised that every child should learn coding. He thinks coding should be taught in school in the same way that fundamental skills like physics, geography, literacy, and math are taught. On the podcast, he clearly stated that coding is a fundamental skill due to the pervasive nature of software. Software already dominates our daily lives, making it difficult to live, travel, or even wake up without it.

Thomas Dohmke, who apart from being a GitHub CEO, essentially identifies himself as a developer has been writing software since the early 1990s. GitHub has been at the forefront of AI code generation. It began working on GitHub Copilot in June 2020 after GPT-3 was introduced. Dohmke believes AI is dramatically changing how people think about software development. Therefore instead of relying completely on AI for code generation, people should consider AI as an aid to software development.

AI tools such as Copilot and ChatGPT can generate basic code from prompts, including simple web pages or small Python games, while existing developers can significantly focus on complex tasks, that requires critical thinking. However, initial concepts often prove more intricate to execute, causing projects to lengthen or stall. AI facilitates this ambition by accelerating the implementation process. Frequent backlogs comprising both new feature development and technical debt, such as outdated code requiring refactoring on part of the developers and that’s when AI comes into rescue as it has the potential to alleviate this workload, certainly increasing developer productivity by 10%, 20%, or even 50%.