[GNC] Sharing Some Changes With the GnuCash Community

[Andre Powell]

A few things.

I added the disclaimer out of respect for the community and the developers.
I have been a professional developer for close to twenty years, and I
largely echo John's perspective. He is spot on about larger shops adopting
these tools already (one of my sons is a developer at one of the companies
he listed and they are using LLMs internally).

Years ago I was a carpenter, and I carried an Estwing California framing
hammer that I absolutely loved. I could drive a 16d nail with one swing,
but that took practice. I was also the type of guy who reluctantly used a
nail gun while still recognizing its effectiveness. Over time, I used my
hammer less and less.

The end result did not really change, and nobody ever asked whether I used
a hammer or a nail gun. That is roughly where I am at with LLM tools.

They are a tool, and I still need to understand the outcome. Does it work?
Does it introduce issues? Can I maintain it? For this particular project,
time was also a factor. I already knew the software I wanted to use, but I
needed additional functionality.

Reports felt like a relatively benign area to experiment while also helping
me understand some of the inner workings of both GnuCash and Scheme.

I still believe individual responsibility and understanding matter. I am
ultimately accountable for the code, whether I typed every character
manually or not.

I understand your perspective and your choice not to use the reports. At
the end of the day, I was simply trying to share something with the
community that might help someone else in a similar position.

Regards,

Andre

On Wed, May 27, 2026 at 9:34 AM John Ralls <jralls at ceridwen.us> wrote:

>
>
> > On May 26, 2026, at 21:41, Adrien Monteleone <
> adrien.monteleone at lusfiber.net> wrote:
> >
> > I simply do not see how or why probabilistic word generators should be
> used for anything but novelty kicks and entertainment
>
> There’s enough code and commentary about the code on the web that the
> probability of generating what the user is asking for very high, as long as
> the user is very specific about what they want, doesn’t ask for too much at
> once, and carefully reviews and corrects the results. An LLM can “type” a
> million or more times faster than a human can, so once the user gets adept
> at writing good prompts the process is is much faster than writing the code
> oneself. I’ve heard/read many senior devs describe it as programming rocket
> fuel.
>
> Regards,
> John Ralls
>
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