A senior software engineer and Redux maintainer shares a deeply personal account of his evolving relationship with AI coding tools. Starting from strong resistance rooted in a belief in craftsmanship, determinism, and deep code understanding, he describes falling into a semi-depressive state from the relentless AI hype cycle. After attending React Miami 2025, he snapped out of it and cautiously began experimenting with AI tools like KiloCode and Claude. Through hands-on work on RTK Query, Immer performance optimizations, and internal tooling, he was repeatedly surprised by AI's practical utility — eventually crossing every 'red line' he had set for himself. The post traces an honest, non-evangelical journey from fear and rejection to pragmatic adoption, while retaining concerns about code quality, junior developer growth, and societal impact.
