u/Clue-Mindless

I'm very conflicted about AI tools. I've used them for years for all kinds of things ever since their inception and I'm completely addicted to them. When it comes to programming it accelerates throughput dramatically and fills in the gaps almost too well. The loop is this right now:

less independent thinking → need Claude for context/design → Claude contributes more decisions → system becomes less internally familiar → need Claude even more.

I have a specific implementation in mind, but then I never just get what I ask for, there is always more contributions which would include a refactor somewhere. As the project grows managing context and architectural coherence becomes critical and I feel like I no longer have a solid internal model.

This coherence degradation is the fundamental crux of why I dislike using AI. I have to explain the project back to Claude and eventually Claude has to explain the project back to me.

Software is about standards, familiar patterns, documentation, a red thread, yadda yadda. But when there are gaps between your understanding and what Claude knows (and what you still believe it knows about the project) then this introduces drift, project rot and a sort of tech debt.

Large context helps, but if you don't have rails and own the critical logic and ideas about how the product will be used, then you will get an inferred result and incorrect solution for your needs. If something important is not present in the model’s context and cannot reliably be inferred from the code, the model has to guess.

This means AI often drifts toward overengineering. People complain about the models but it's really just an issue with your lack of scope. If I don't make a clear plan it will suggest an overengineered solution that creates a sort of contextual tech debt to the codebase.

I can see how these tools would accelerate a seasoned software engineer with great organizational skills and who's been in the business for decade. I'm not a professional . Any code I wrote before was mediocre at best and not so elegant. I struggle to the point where I don't want to do development of any kind because going back to "manual" coding is just going to feel like molasses, but I also don't want to ship stuff this way.

I’m the one man IT at 70+ company and growing.
I make peanuts something like 20$ an hour motivated by the fact that I do onboardings and ”simple stuff”.
I do much more. I set up networks, work on security posture, help devs with an integration. I do it partially to stay sane but to also do work I enjoy. It also kills me that we use consumer grade wireless mesh crap as stand in for our APs or having to order low yield expensive toners for the printer every week (among other barbaric practices…).
I therefore handle anything under the sun that could be classified as IT , bar lightbulbs which I would think an electrician should handle.

I hate the work, because most of it is day to day operations, mind numbing create one time password and enter it type of work. There is no time over or encouragement to improve a process just ”make it work for as cheap as possible”. I hate giving new hires crap equipment, it’s like I want to apologize out of shame.
It feels obviously like a dead end type of role, I was hoping to do something else than chase devices and be the monkey. Is this what I practiced for? Is IT really this much of a shitshow? Am I a massochist and just want to prove something?

I sometimes think that I would be better off working at a McDonalds, at least there I come in and have a fixed routine of tasks without wishing for amphetamines and coffee to stay ahead of the madness. Heck, if I’m going to pass butter it
would make sense to do so at a restaurant.
The work I am doing right now feels twice as chaotic because at least at Mikey Ds there’s this concept of having roles.

And yes, I’ve asked for help and got a person who doen’t know IT that comes in once a blue moon that I have to train in addition to everything else because management just thinks I need an extra pair of hands.

Is this just bad luck or is IT really like this now?

Edit: Okay, yes, service job or line cook isn’t
comparable but as ome guy who has to juggle a bunch of things and worry about stuff constantly even off hours a more defined job seems more appealing.

I keep seeing job ads where ONE PERSON is expected to handle:

Daily support.
Onboarding and offboarding.
Hardware purchasing.
Configuration of computers and phones.
Microsoft 365 administration.
SharePoint and Teams structure.
Intune and Defender.
Identities, permissions, and access governance.
Vendor contacts.
Documentation.
Process improvements.
Security.
AI Integration Projects.
Automations and scripting.
And preferably “create structure” on top of all of that.

Yeah, you can fuck right off - that's an entire IT department. There's no shot anyone would have enough time in a day for all this shit. That's 5-6 different high responsibility roles baked into an IT-support fantasy.

https://preview.redd.it/rku7bdcdpzyg1.png?width=1448&format=png&auto=webp&s=80e891455c8557c7a5e003c7c5741097c503b2ca

Now we can finally put this shit to rest

Really silly question.The "start stop" vm logic app that runs daily to start and stop a VM. Does anyone know how much would that cost per month? I'm thinking of making a runbook but I just don't have the time for that right now.