Posts: Ai

I think AI is pushing me toward the AGPL

Why agentic coding changes everything for the open-source craft and maintainership.

It has been two months since I’ve been using AI coding agents “for real”. In my previous article, I reflected on my experiment to vibe-code a full Emacs module from scratch. In there, I intentionally left one important question unanswered: what is the meaning and impact of agentic coding on the free software ecosystem we have all grown accustomed to?

Right now, I have many thoughts but no good answers, and the reason is that the more I use these tools, the more I doubt my long-held beliefs about open-source licensing. While I’ve found that agentic coding makes me more productive—provided I supervise the agents carefully, in some circumstances—it also distances me from the act of coding itself, stripping away the pride of craftsmanship and thus the desire to publish code as open source.

The bigger worry, however, is for the ecosystem as a whole. Let’s dive into what’s on my mind right now.

March 17, 2026 · Tags: ai, blogsystem5, opinion
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Reflections on vibecoding ticket.el

It has now been a month since I started playing with Claude Code “for real” and by now I’ve mostly switched to Codex CLI: it is much snappier—who would imagine that a “Rewrite in Rust” would make things tangibly faster—and the answers feel more to-the-point than Claude’s to me.

As part of this experiment, I decided to go all-in with the crazy idea of vibecoding a project without even looking at the code. The project I embarked on is an Emacs module to wrap a CLI ticket tracking tool designed to be used in conjunction with coding agents. Quite fitting for the journey, I’d say.

In this article, I’d like to present a bunch of reflections on this relatively-simple vibecoding journey. But first, let’s look at what the Emacs module does.

March 6, 2026 · Tags: ai, blogsystem5, ticket.el
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Grumpy Julio plays with CLI coding agents

Or the more tired “One week with Claude Code”-type article.

It’s no secret that I’ve been grumpy about the new AI-based coding trend. I’ve been grumpy about the “push from above to use AI or else”. I’ve been grumpy about the eye-rolling hype I see on LinkedIn. I’ve been grumpy about being on the receiving end of vibe-coded PRs that over-engineer solutions to simple problems. I’ve been grumpy about the thought that we are about to see an amount of bloat like we have never imagined before.

But, at the same time, I’ve been using LLMs to review my articles, to perform deep research, to generate cover pictures, and before last week, I had even dipped my toes into AI-based coding agents to help me with boring, repetitive tasks. And you know what? I see their promise of increased productivity, yet the amounts of slop I’ve witnessed make me skeptical and I have had little experience with coding agents myself to judge their promised usefulness.

So… surprise! Last weekend I decided to start a Claude Code subscription and, after spending a week on it, I am uncomfortably excited to use it more. How has this happened? Let’s take a look at how I ended here, the kinds of mini-projects I worked on throughout this past week, and the (semi-expected) downsides I encountered.

February 9, 2026 · Tags: ai, blogsystem5
Continue reading (about 12 minutes)