With the rise of AI, serverless architectures, and Web3 technologies, how do you see the future of web development evolving in the next 5 years?

[Scot C Brown]

Web development is changing rapidly with advancements in AI, automation, and decentralized tech. As low-code/no-code solutions gain traction, will traditional development still hold its ground, or are we heading toward a completely new era of web creation?

 

[fisicx]

Eh?

Didn’t understand a word of that. Can you say that again without the jargon and add your own views on the question.

 

[apricot]

From my perspective, it has another 20 years to go… It’s nothing but a balloon! Right now, it produces nothing but rubbish content, yet everyone seems crazy about it.

I must admit, there is one thing I love about AI: content checking. I always found adding 'the' and 'a' s unnecessary in English, so I unintentionally ignore using them, and it corrects for me.

 

[antropy]

From my perspective, it has another 20 years to go…

So you don't believe Ray Kurzweil is right in predicting that we'll have human-level intelligence by 2029?

Personally I don't think web developers have much more than 3-5 years.

Paul.

 

[fisicx]

Personally I don't think web developers have much more than 3-5 years.

Possibly. But the more niche your business the better your chances of survival.

I've been working with an AI bod in Finland and no matter how hard he tries he still can get any of his AI tools to build anything close to the custom plugins I develop. But they are getting better at implementing APIs. That's saving me a whole chunk of time.

 

[antropy]

he still can get any of his AI tools to build anything close to the custom plugins I develop

At this point, it seems the limit is roughly a few pages of code in one file at a time, and it still needs a lot of babysitting.

So at this point, AI certainly can't replace us. I'm just extrapolating.

Paul.

 

[Ozzy]

Who is your question aimed at?

I feel the majority of business owners who need a website don't care; they just want a good-quality website that delivers on whatever they need it for.
So my opinion specifically on your questions is that it really doesn't matter. The world and the way we do things are always in a state of perpetual evolution, never-ending. Web design and web coding will continue to evolve and change, and the tools we use will do the same. When I started some 25+ years ago you had to code websites in raw HTML about 15 years ago tools came along that did the code for you with wizards, and now those tools are a bit smarter. That's all.

 

[martin_shl]

So far, what I've tried to get AI to do has not been successful. It requires lots of correction and iteration to get something usable. I'll probably try an API as @fisicx reports some success on that.
But the idea that someone can say what they want a website to do and AI will get that right without a lot of iterations I think is still quite a way off.

 

[fisicx]

Especially as most clients don’t have a clue what they want. Which usually means weeks of back and forth.

Building the actual website is the easy bit.

 

[UKSBD]

But the idea that someone can say what they want a website to do and AI will get that right without a lot of iterations I think is still quite a way off.

The thing is, someone may say what they want a website to do, but AI will know there is a better thing to do than what the person thinks.

Basically, person will say "I want a website to do this" AI will say, "no you don't, this is a much better way of doing it" thus cutting out all the back and forth that fisicx mentions.

 

[DoolallyTap]

I started using Chat recently and have found it frighteningly useful. It produced some excel formula's within seconds and answered many questions in huge detail. The current SEO search systems are going to be obsolete almost overnight. I am already using it for automatic short descriptions on product listings.
The rate of change is going to be massively fast

 

[Nathanto]

But the idea that someone can say what they want a website to do and AI will get that right without a lot of iterations I think is still quite a way off.

As @fisicx says though, that's no different to how it works with a human web developer. The difference is that AI is available any time of the day or night, responses/changes are immediate and even more importantly it's practically free.

FWIW I think the days of the bog standard web developer are numbered and I think most could be out of work even sooner than @antropy's suggested 3-5 years.

 

[fisicx]

Try asking AI to build a site with a complex structure that uses an API to pull data. Then add in a quote system and contact form. Also write case studies and select appropriate images. Connect with your insurance policies and write legal pages.

No matter how good your prompt you will still need developers to build the site.

Would you really trust an AI tool with all your logins, public and private keys or DB credentials?

 

[Nathanto]

Try asking AI to build a site with a complex structure that uses an API to pull data.

I agree that here and now today complex sites may be too much for AI to be worthwhile but as @DoolallyTap says "The rate of change is going to be massively fast".

I only took an interest in AI a couple of months ago and have already seen how quickly it is developing, only last week I noticed a new option with ChatGPT called "Deep research". You don't need to be a genius to foresee that AI will amass new features and capabilities at an ever-increasing rate.

Would you really trust an AI tool with all your logins, public and private keys or DB credentials?

You don't need to trust AI with your private logins etc., you store sensitive stuff securely/locally and have any code that AI generates simply reference your secure location - the AI tool never sees your actual passwords.

 

[antropy]

FWIW I think the days of the bog standard web developer are numbered and I think most could be out of work even sooner than @antropy's suggested 3-5 years.

Could well be

Paul.

 

[antropy]

Try asking AI to build a site with a complex structure that uses an API to pull data. Then add in a quote system and contact form. Also write case studies and select appropriate images. Connect with your insurance policies and write legal pages.

Yep, I think we're all aware that at this point, this is well beyond the current capabilities of AI.

Paul.

 

[fisicx]

Yep, I think we're all aware that at this point, this is well beyond the current capabilities of AI.

I suspect it will beyond capabilities for a long time. Generative AI is excellent at components but putting a package together isn’t practical. There are way too many variables for a LLM to process.

 

[antropy]

I suspect it will beyond capabilities for a long time.

Given the rapid and accelerating exponential rate of improvement, what would your guess be?

Paul.

 

[fisicx]

Given the rapid and accelerating exponential rate of improvement, what would your guess be?

No idea. But it won't be using an LLM. You need a whole different way of doing things if you are planing to use AI to build you a DB driven website. You would need a higher level a tool that builds the structure and then maybe use an LLM to generate each file and then different tools to do all the SQL queries and then bolts everything together.

Standard Generative AI is a single query tool. What you need is something higher level that can do multiple prompts and then bolt everything together. A standard LLM won't be able to do this as this isn't the way they are designed.

 

[NickZ]

Web development is changing rapidly with advancements in AI, automation, and decentralized tech. As low-code/no-code solutions gain traction, will traditional development still hold its ground, or are we heading toward a completely new era of web creation?

Web3 is a myth: blockchain for mail-services? Web-server,, DNS Server etc.?
Low code just produces garbish. 90% of all CMS don't need to be CMS to begin with.
In 10 years not we might get a real AI. Maybe, so far it is just a preprogrammed software.
You should stay away from those hypes.

 

[antropy]

No idea. But it won't be using an LLM.

A standard LLM won't be able to do this as this isn't the way they are designed.

It probably will be an LLM but it will probably need to have lots more stuff available to it as test time, e.g. multiple passes, memory, writing a plan and following it etc.

Paul.