My obituary for programming

Jeremy Scheff’s essay “My obituary for programming,” published on dumbmatter.com and surfaced by Simon Willison on October 19, 2026, argues that AI coding agents have eliminated a specific pleasure once central to professional programming: solving tricky logic puzzles for pay.

Scheff’s piece, as quoted by Willison, describes programming’s appeal in these terms: the job paid people to work on “tricky little logic puzzles,” with difficulty correlating to compensation. Even simple puzzles carried worth, Scheff writes. Willison characterizes the essay as capturing, in his word, a loss poignantly felt by career programmers who valued that puzzle-solving dimension of the craft.

The available material does not specify further detail on how Scheff frames the transition, what evidence or personal history he draws on, or what conclusions he reaches about the future of the profession. Willison’s summary stops at the core claim: that coding agents have displaced the puzzle-work that made programming distinctive as an occupation, and that this represents a genuine loss for those who did it.

No additional sources accompany this item. The citation is Willison’s October 19, 2026 linkblog entry pointing to Scheff’s original essay, dated to the same period, hosted on dumbmatter.com.