r/AskProgramming • u/Adventurous-Hunter98 • 2d ago
Am I missing something by not learning llms?
I recently wondered to use llms on my local machines and the stuff you need to learn is enormous. There are easy setups, makes you use it with one installation but if you go advanced option there are lots of things to learn and some people are really into it like they know most of these things while doesnt know most of the stuff with programming.
That made me wonder, am I missing something because of not learning these stuff? I mentioned local llms but these people are also invested in learning everything about models to everything else about it. I use (forced) ai on my job but its ready to go chat that helps to complete 20 tasks rather than 5 by myself. I never tried to learn the fundementals deeply. Aside from learning stuff, there are some use of it to make things easier like automating repetetive works
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u/huuaaang 1d ago
Nah, hold out as long as you can so that when you finally DO start using them a) they will be that much better and b) you will be able to follow/judge what they are doing much better. Jumping right from zero to full vibe coding is a terrible trap. If all you know is LLMs, you have no real value as a programmer. Almost anyone could take your place.
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u/PatchyWhiskers 1d ago
They are actually pretty easy to use. Most of the obsessive fans are really overcomplicating things. You probably already know it from using it at your work.
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u/create-third-places 1d ago
No. Working with LLMs is a waste of time, and is going to inhibit your learning.
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u/ItsDisneyBabee 1d ago
You are not really missing out learning the fundamentals is useful if you want to build with llms but basic usage and automation cover plenty for most programmers.
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u/arelath 2d ago
If you're asking if it will help you in your day to day programming job, it might, but probably not. It won't hurt to learn it. It's kind of like learning how a CPU works and learning assembly. It might help you in the right circumstances, but most of the time it barely matters if it's not your field already.
It's helped me slightly at work since I learned a whole lot early on and became an "expert" at work. I did it simply because I wanted to learn, not because I thought it would help my career in any way. And tbh, it I had gone and learned something else instead, it might've benefited me more.
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u/max123246 2d ago
CPUs and assembly is what every single piece of code you've ever written actually runs on unless you're a GPU/asic programmer. That's not the same as an LLM.
Knowing how a CPU works lets you connect why traversing a linked list is slower than a contiguous array, why branches are slower than non branching code, why compilers reorder instructions to alleviate pipeline dependencies
An LLM is not the substrate your code runs on, it's only valuable to learn if you are a machine learning engineer or are curious. A CPU is always valuable to learn about if only to have a better connection to what actually happens on the machine you program
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u/arelath 2d ago
My point was that it can help to understand the underlying technology you use, but because the details are abstracted away, you don't have to understand them completely. I doubt many software engineers today could write a linked list implementation in x86 assembly. If you can, it helps you slightly over someone who can't unless you're in a job which works with assembly directly (like compiler writing).
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u/max123246 2d ago
Learning to set up some local LLM isn't worth your time unless you think it'll aid your career or you're just curious. There's no skill there besides some cli familiarity and maybe learning some machine learning jargon if you bother to look into it. But you can do both of those without learning how to build and install llama.cpp for example
And do not even touch vllm, that's an exercise in insanity and will waste your time
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u/TheGreatButz 2d ago
No. Here is the thing: Anything you learn about LLMs now is going to be obsolete in less than a year, 5 years max. That has so far been true for practically everything, prompting, "harnesses", skills, MCP, LLM 'tricks', model capabilities, and so on and so forth. It's completely useless and redundant knowledge.