Jonathan Cast /s

Neoliberal. Neoconservative. Fundamentalist Christian.

Non-termination belongs in a monad.

Retweets mean *I* agree, that's hardly an endorsement.

[Jonathan Cast /s @jonathanccast]

The Global Script way of programming:

Start by figuring out what the user wants to do
Then write a formal description of a system that does what the user needs
Then build a system that implements that formal description, as efficiently as possible

[Jonathan Cast /s @jonathanccast]

Also, please please please give us money, we're about to go bankrupt!

[Greg Brockman @gdb]

Software development is undergoing a renaissance in front of our eyes.

If you haven't used the tools recently, you likely are underestimating what you're missing. Since December, there's been a step function improvement in what tools like Codex can do. Some great engineers at OpenAI yesterday told me that their job has fundamentally changed since December. Prior to then, they could use Codex for unit tests; now it writes essentially all the code and does a great deal of their operations and debugging. Not everyone has yet made that leap, but it's usually because of factors besides the capability of the model.

Every company faces the same opportunity now, and navigating it well — just like with cloud computing or the Internet — requires careful thought. This post shares how OpenAI is currently approaching retooling our teams towards agentic software development. We're still learning and iterating, but here's how we're thinking about it right now:

As a first step, by March 31st, we're aiming that:

(1) For any technical task, the tool of first resort for humans is interacting with an agent rather than using an editor or terminal.
(2) The default way humans utilize agents is explicitly evaluated as safe, but also productive enough that most workflows do not need additional permissions.

In order to get there, here's what we recommended to the team a few weeks ago:

1. Take the time to try out the tools. The tools do sell themselves — many people have had amazing experiences with 5.2 in Codex, after having churned from codex web a few months ago. But many people are also so busy they haven't had a chance to try Codex yet or got stuck thinking "is there any way it could do X" rather than just trying.
- Designate an "agents captain" for your team — the primary person responsible for thinking about how agents can be brought into the teams' workflow.
- Share experiences or questions in a few designated internal channels
- Take a day for a company-wide Codex hackathon

2. Create skills and AGENTS[.md].
- Create and maintain an AGENTS[.md] for any project you work on; update the AGENTS[.md] whenever the agent does something wrong or struggles with a task.
- Write skills for anything that you get Codex to do, and commit it to the skills directory in a shared repository

3. Inventory and make accessible any internal tools.
- Maintain a list of tools that your team relies on, and make sure someone takes point on making it agent-accessible (such as via a CLI or MCP server).

4. Structure codebases to be agent-first. With the models changing so fast, this is still somewhat untrodden ground, and will require some exploration.
- Write tests which are quick to run, and create high-quality interfaces between components.

5. Say no to slop. Managing AI generated code at scale is an emerging problem, and will require new processes and conventions to keep code quality high
- Ensure that some human is accountable for any code that gets merged. As a code reviewer, maintain at least the same bar as you would for human-written code, and make sure the author understands what they're submitting.

6. Work on basic infra. There's a lot of room for everyone to build basic infrastructure, which can be guided by internal user feedback. The core tools are getting a lot better and more usable, but there's a lot of infrastructure that currently go around the tools, such as observability, tracking not just the committed code but the agent trajectories that led to them, and central management of the tools that agents are able to use.

Overall, adopting tools like Codex is not just a technical but also a deep cultural change, with a lot of downstream implications to figure out. We encourage every manager to drive this with their team, and to think through other action items — for example, per item 5 above, what else can prevent a lot of "functionally-correct but poorly-maintainable code" from creeping into codebases.

[Jonathan Cast /s @jonathanccast]

Sure, it's been false every time they've said it up until now, but please believe them when they say it's true this time!

[Greg Brockman @gdb]

Software development is undergoing a renaissance in front of our eyes.

If you haven't used the tools recently, you likely are underestimating what you're missing. Since December, there's been a step function improvement in what tools like Codex can do. Some great engineers at OpenAI yesterday told me that their job has fundamentally changed since December. Prior to then, they could use Codex for unit tests; now it writes essentially all the code and does a great deal of their operations and debugging. Not everyone has yet made that leap, but it's usually because of factors besides the capability of the model.

Every company faces the same opportunity now, and navigating it well — just like with cloud computing or the Internet — requires careful thought. This post shares how OpenAI is currently approaching retooling our teams towards agentic software development. We're still learning and iterating, but here's how we're thinking about it right now:

As a first step, by March 31st, we're aiming that:

(1) For any technical task, the tool of first resort for humans is interacting with an agent rather than using an editor or terminal.
(2) The default way humans utilize agents is explicitly evaluated as safe, but also productive enough that most workflows do not need additional permissions.

In order to get there, here's what we recommended to the team a few weeks ago:

1. Take the time to try out the tools. The tools do sell themselves — many people have had amazing experiences with 5.2 in Codex, after having churned from codex web a few months ago. But many people are also so busy they haven't had a chance to try Codex yet or got stuck thinking "is there any way it could do X" rather than just trying.
- Designate an "agents captain" for your team — the primary person responsible for thinking about how agents can be brought into the teams' workflow.
- Share experiences or questions in a few designated internal channels
- Take a day for a company-wide Codex hackathon

2. Create skills and AGENTS[.md].
- Create and maintain an AGENTS[.md] for any project you work on; update the AGENTS[.md] whenever the agent does something wrong or struggles with a task.
- Write skills for anything that you get Codex to do, and commit it to the skills directory in a shared repository

3. Inventory and make accessible any internal tools.
- Maintain a list of tools that your team relies on, and make sure someone takes point on making it agent-accessible (such as via a CLI or MCP server).

4. Structure codebases to be agent-first. With the models changing so fast, this is still somewhat untrodden ground, and will require some exploration.
- Write tests which are quick to run, and create high-quality interfaces between components.

5. Say no to slop. Managing AI generated code at scale is an emerging problem, and will require new processes and conventions to keep code quality high
- Ensure that some human is accountable for any code that gets merged. As a code reviewer, maintain at least the same bar as you would for human-written code, and make sure the author understands what they're submitting.

6. Work on basic infra. There's a lot of room for everyone to build basic infrastructure, which can be guided by internal user feedback. The core tools are getting a lot better and more usable, but there's a lot of infrastructure that currently go around the tools, such as observability, tracking not just the committed code but the agent trajectories that led to them, and central management of the tools that agents are able to use.

Overall, adopting tools like Codex is not just a technical but also a deep cultural change, with a lot of downstream implications to figure out. We encourage every manager to drive this with their team, and to think through other action items — for example, per item 5 above, what else can prevent a lot of "functionally-correct but poorly-maintainable code" from creeping into codebases.

[Jonathan Cast /s @jonathanccast]

Waldenses vs. Rome: The Church in the Wilderness | Sabbath Evidence https://t.co/r3KMy4fKF6 via @YouTube

[Jonathan Cast /s @jonathanccast]

New Sunday Law Proposition, Facts & Fables | Doug Batchelor https://t.co/065CzZBYco via @YouTube

[Jonathan Cast /s @jonathanccast]

@rabbriansamuel God wills for people to violate His commandments?

Exodus 12:27 is quite clear that the Passover is the sacrifice, and Deuteronomy 16:5 is quite clear that the Passover may not be kept anywhere but where the Temple is.

[David Harsanyi @davidharsanyi]

Fun fact: the Hanukah story isn't in the Jewish Bible, but it is in the Catholic Bible!

[Yaron (Ron) Minsky @yminsky]

@geoffreylitt @Gilad_Bracha Also, I think interactivity is often a hindrance in learning programming. I found there was a lot of power from doing what I called "paper racket" with my kids. Basically, pen and paper exercises in understanding what a scheme program did.

[Jonathan Cast /s @jonathanccast]

@megynkelly @benshapiro @bariweiss @TPUSA @MrsErikaKirk What's been going on in public is embarrassing enough for you

[David Bernstein @ProfDBernstein]

Blowing up school buses, pizza parlors, school cafeterias, Passover seders and so forth is a very intensely violent version of nonviolence

[RE-OPEN THE SIZZLERS @SaladBarFan]

This is so funny because in the article they talk about how the unions were pushing for even more racial discrimination against white men.

[John Stossel @JohnStossel]

That meme about how everything used to be better when I was growing up?

It’s wrong

To reduce the spread of misinformation, I corrected it for you.

https://t.co/OCCg7YuXAq

[Jordan K. Carpenter 🇺🇸 @JCarpenterTN]

He is here:
the one who forms the mountains,
creates the wind,
and reveals his thoughts to man,
the one who makes the dawn out of darkness
and strides on the heights of the earth.
The LORD, the God of Armies, is his name.

[Dominic Pino @DominicJPino]

Bipartisan, of course, since Democrats controlled the House his entire presidency. But Reagan took the lead on it, they cut benefits and raised the payroll tax, and he crushed Mondale anyway.
https://t.co/l2IHU10Z2q

[Michael Watson @MichaelWatsonDC]

like Harvard admissions, this gets the microscope treatment because people who write a lot care a great deal about employment in writing jobs where this sort of thing was likely common.

But it's a problem for Harmeet Dhillon at DOJ and/or for EEOC, not overthrowing society.

[Jonathan Cast /s @jonathanccast]

@DominicJPino Saying it wasn't successful in establishing black supremacy is not the same thing as saying it didn't make us worse off.

Jim Crow mostly produced the same result as a meritocracy: white people in power, but it still really mattered that it wasn't exactly the same.

[Jonathan Cast /s @jonathanccast]

@alppouch All of MAGA are outsiders destroying the conservative movement. Y'all were all Democrats until five minutes ago, and you're still center-left at heart.

[The Royal Commentator USA @barristerlawusa]

I had a student in my graduate program who was a PoC who was “passed on.” I told her she would need to drop my class so she could take a remedial reading/writing class. Her mother with the DOC made an appointment with the Dean who told me I had to come.

I asked mom to read the paper I brought outload. She did and said this is garbage. She asked me who wrote this PoS. I said your daughter. She said, this is not even literate. I agreed.

She asked her daughter what was going on. Her daughter cried and then the first truth came out. That’s the best she could do.

A college graduate who was illiterate because her mother came in and threatened every teacher to pass her on. I said to the mother, if your daughter puts in the effort and brings her verbal up, she can retake my class and I’ll waive the fees provided the Dean agrees. The Dean agreed.

That young lady took two years to get up to speed and she retake my class.

She now has a PhD and I promise you she has no attitude and she tells this story to all her students. Do not pass a failing student on. It always comes back to hurt the student. 🥰

[Jonathan Cast /s @jonathanccast]

@ThymeToBeBorn Calvinism doesn't say God knew who would be lost. It says He actively desires the wicked to be lost, and does nothing to save them.

[Jonathan Cast /s @jonathanccast]

Basically admitting that Calvinism is based on human reason and not faithfulness to the word of God.

[ThymeToBeBorn @ThymeToBeBorn]

Any alternative explanation is just mental gymnastics to get out of this very, very obvious truth. Thank you David Bentley Hart for steelmaning Calvinism and really GETTING IT.

[Jonathan Cast /s @jonathanccast]

@RTSG_Main What does this have to do with your Tweet?

Nixon was hardly a communist, after all.

Historically, capitalist societies have always had less work and more wealth than socialist societies.