Re: [Hamlib-developer] The use of LLM generated code in Hamlib (long)

[Mikael N. <mik...@fa...>]

On Fri, Feb 27, 2026, at 16:16, Greg Troxel wrote:
> "Mikael Nousiainen" <mik...@fa...> writes:
>
>> Did we ever land to any decision regarding LLM usage in Hamlib?
>
> This is an interesting opinion, and I think it has considerable merit.
>
> https://lists.debian.org/debian-vote/2026/02/msg00060.html

Thanks for noting this. However, I read this particular opinion saying: "there is no way genAI can be done right and we should therefore abandon it" - which is a rather extreme viewpoint that I don't share. The fact that many large AI companies are not doing a particularly good job ethically (training their models) should _not_ mean automatically that "all genAI is bad and will be like that forever". Not sure if I understood something incorrectly?

I'll have to read the full discussion on that mailing list, as I'm interested to know the details, but it'll take some time.

>
>> Hypothetically, how can project maintainers even know some code has
>> been generated by an LLM - especially if there's a skilled developer
>> reviewing and cleaning up the code before sharing it? I think this
>> goes to the same category as using StackOverflow or "whatever Google
>> results give you" as a starting point.
>
> It's also similar to someone taking proprietary code and submitting it.
> At some point we are believing people when they offer code with
> Signed-Off-By: or implicitly under the inbound=outbound convention.
> Whether that trust is misplaced is a general issue, and it's not
> particularly about LLM code.

Exactly. How can we trust any contributor, since "faking it" (= generating the code) is easier than ever and requires practically no effort? Also, I'd argue not all LLM-generated code is automatically proprietary - just like not all StackOverflow or "whatever Google gives you" is proprietary. It's a rather complex issue.

>
>> I'd rephrase the question as: How can Hamlib "keep up" and do it in a
>> responsible and ethical way?
>
> My take is that saying "how do we keep up" is presupposing the answer to
> the fundamental question.
>
> 73 de n1dam

That's not really what I meant, it's likely me as a non-native English speaker ending up with bad word choices. :)

My intent was more like: How can we keep Hamlib alive and thriving when we know masses (including many of Hamlib's current and potential future contributors) are going for genAI? And: can we find responsible/ethical ways of using genAI?

The same goes for majority of open-source projects, of course.

73,
Mikael OH3BHX