Using AI to speed up development

[GPGeorge]

I've heard that you must continually remind Chatty, et al, of your coding standards. Also, you must insist that they are used consistently. Does that correspond to your experience?

 

[RaptorRaptur]

well I know this isn't 'Access', but I use it a lot for refactoring T-SQL and converting T-SQL to Snowflake SQL, it's quite good once I learned a few gotcha's and now instruct ChatGPT to avoid those pitfalls.

One of the things I have enjoyed leveraging is the limitless amount of granularity you can include in telling ChatGPT's memory about how you want your SQL formatted. I have seen a lot of SSMS add-ons in my day, Redgate's SQL Prompt being the main one, but absolutely nothing - no tool in the world - compares with my ability to verbosely tell ChatGPT every minute detail about how I want it to format code. I could even tell it to produce a line break after x-number of characters in an IN clause specifically, or put every individual boolean expression in a where clause on the new line, etc.
That's one reason I use ChatGPT and not an AI tool without a memory, to me without a memory is worthless - my whole productivity gain IS about the memory

Do you have any idea how good ChatGBT would be with VBA and/or the Access way of handling SQL?

 

[GPGeorge]

It depends on a number of factors, but the short summary is that AI can speed up iterative, or incremental coding projects.

At least two of the basic factors to account for include good, detailed prompting and skeptical verification of output.

By that I mean specifying exactly what the circumstances and context are in which you and the AI are going to work. Be clear about your own role (Project Manager, lead developer, neophyte, whatever) and the AI's role (expert coder, code monkey, whatever). Lay out your design specifications in advance.

And never accept the initial attempt of your AI to provide you with code. Validate it, test it, dissect it and make sure it does what you want and need it to do.

It can speed up the process in some cases as you off-load the actual writing of the code. It can not substitute for due diligence on your part.

 

[RaptorRaptur]

It depends on a number of factors, but the short summary is that AI can speed up iterative, or incremental coding projects.

At least two of the basic factors to account for include good, detailed prompting and skeptical verification of output.

By that I mean specifying exactly what the circumstances and context are in which you and the AI are going to work. Be clear about your own role (Project Manager, lead developer, neophyte, whatever) and the AI's role (expert coder, code monkey, whatever). Lay out your design specifications in advance.

And never accept the initial attempt of your AI to provide you with code. Validate it, test it, dissect it and make sure it does what you want and need it to do.

It can speed up the process in some cases as you off-load the actual writing of the code. It can not substitute for due diligence on your part.

Thank you George,
I have had a lot of fun playing with AI over the last few days. Now starts the real work. I will take your recommendations to heart and spend some time doing just that

Regards

Alan

 

[Imb]

Thank you George,
I have had a lot of fun playing with AI over the last few days. Now starts the real work. I will take your recommendations to heart and spend some time doing just that

Regards

Alan

I believe more in generalization and re-use of code than automatic generation of "duplicate" code.

Imb.

 

[GPGeorge]

Help me understand how that principle, with which I agree, applies to the use of AI to create new code solutions to new problems.

 

[CJ_London]

agree with other comments - I have noticed that unless you reinforce that you are using Access VBA, AI's can slip back into providing code intended for excel. A fair number of functions exist in excel vba but not access vba - latest one it tried to foist on me is the excel Max function, and the nz function does not exist in Excel vba because it does not have the concept of 'null'

 

[NauticalGent]

I've heard that you must continually remind Chatty, et al, of your coding standards. Also, you must insist that they are used consistently. Does that correspond to your experience?

I had the same experience until I started using the paid version. Its almost scary how tailored and familiar it has become...

 

[The_Doc_Man]

I have noticed that unless you reinforce that you are using Access VBA, AI's can slip back into providing code intended for excel.

I agree with CJ's comments including his comments subsequent to my quote. I will put my own spin on them. VBA is the same for everything in Office that uses VBA because they all use the same VBA library (VBA Code >> Tools >> References). What is different is the main program's libraries and objects that are part of the environment; those can/will differ from one Office member to the next. But there is where Chatty and the other AIs have the problem. If you don't specify the context, they might assume Excel when you meant Access because BOTH of those are valid users of VBA and are part of Office. When you make references to objects in VBA, you sometimes have to prefix / preface your actions to establish a context first - like DAO.Recordset vs. ADODB.Recordset, or using a WITH clause on a specific object to establish an object context. No different with Chatty. You have to assure it knows the context.

 

[CJ_London]

You still need to know your code - I wanted to find a way to make the detail onPaint event conditional to reduce flicker every time a control was clicked on or the detail section was scrolled. AI told me it can't be done and suggested alternatives such as conditional formatting, UDF, etc.

I found a way - onPaint now only fires when I need it to.

 

[GPGeorge]

You still need to know your code - I wanted to find a way to make the detail onPaint event conditional to reduce flicker every time a control was clicked on or the detail section was scrolled. AI told me it can't be done and suggested alternatives such as conditional formatting, UDF, etc.

I found a way - onPaint now only fires when I need it to.

I've had similar experiences with Claude incorrectly telling me something can, or can't be done. Hence the need for a cycle of prompting, testing and reprompting.

One example was a newer feature in the PowerApps environment that Claude hadn't yet encountered, the ability to execute Stored Procedures directly.

He wanted to use Power Automate, which works and which was the earlier implementation. He only relented when I pointed him to documentation from Microsoft on the new feature.

As someone I respect reminds me quite often, when working with assisted intelligence, one of you has to be the adult in the room.