The thing is that you and grandma were only accomplishing static sites back then. You can still do that today with many more options than you had back then and you can even use many of the exact same methods.
But when it comes to actually accomplishing something with application logic on the web, Grandma could ask the AI agent literally all these questions and get solid answers. At any point you get confused you can just ask what to do. You can highlight a line of code and ask “what does this mean?” You can even say “I want this web page to be put online what do I do?”
Beats waiting for a human to answer you.
You’re also taking my example application way too literally. No I don’t know why Grandma needs a signup form, I just couldn’t think of a web app off the top of my head.
MS Access and WSYWIG tools like FrontPage and iWeb were not good. I know because I was there and I used FrontPage at work. A link to your email (get spammed forever) is not a replacement for an application or email form. The whole reason code is preferred over WYSIWYG is because you inevitably have issues with change management even for simple personal projects, which is why static site generators have gained popularity. I’m sure your grandma could have handled markdown + someone else’s Hugo template + Netlify.
Hell, if we want to talk about progress in WYSIWYG editors, Trix greatly improved and modernized the shortfalls of that process and that was launched in 2014, less than 10 years ago. So even in the world of WSYWIG we have better tools now than before.
IIS has not been removed from Windows home edition, by the way.
But when it comes to actually accomplishing something with application logic on the web, Grandma could ask the AI agent literally all these questions and get solid answers. At any point you get confused you can just ask what to do. You can highlight a line of code and ask “what does this mean?” You can even say “I want this web page to be put online what do I do?”
Beats waiting for a human to answer you.
You’re also taking my example application way too literally. No I don’t know why Grandma needs a signup form, I just couldn’t think of a web app off the top of my head.
MS Access and WSYWIG tools like FrontPage and iWeb were not good. I know because I was there and I used FrontPage at work. A link to your email (get spammed forever) is not a replacement for an application or email form. The whole reason code is preferred over WYSIWYG is because you inevitably have issues with change management even for simple personal projects, which is why static site generators have gained popularity. I’m sure your grandma could have handled markdown + someone else’s Hugo template + Netlify.
Hell, if we want to talk about progress in WYSIWYG editors, Trix greatly improved and modernized the shortfalls of that process and that was launched in 2014, less than 10 years ago. So even in the world of WSYWIG we have better tools now than before.
IIS has not been removed from Windows home edition, by the way.