Building Claude Code with Boris Cherny

By Pragmatic Engineer

Categories: Product, Startup

Summary

Boris Cherny, the creator of Claude Code, reveals how he ships 20-30 pull requests per day with zero handwritten code, thanks to AI-generated code. He believes we're living through a transformative time akin to the printing press, where new categories of writers and authors have emerged.

Key Takeaways

  1. Boris Cherny was one of the most prolific code authors and reviewers at Meta, leading code quality across Instagram, Facebook, WhatsApp, and Messenger.
  2. At Anthropic, Boris's first pull request was rejected, not because of bad code, but because he wrote it by hand, highlighting the shift towards AI-generated code.
  3. Boris believes the current transformation in coding is akin to the printing press, where new categories of writers and authors emerged as the market for literature expanded.
  4. Boris is shipping 20-30 pull requests per day at Anthropic, with Claude Code writing 100% of the code and him not editing a single line manually.
  5. The rapid improvement of AI models means that ideas that worked with the old model might not work with the new model, requiring a rethinking of engineering skills and workflows.
  6. Andre Carpet, a programmer, has never felt as much behind as he is now, highlighting the challenges developers face in keeping up with the pace of AI progress.

Topics

Transcript Excerpt

You were the first ever TypeScript book with O'Reilly. >> Yeah, I found that book translated in Japanese in this little town in Japan. That was just the coolest moment. And then I realized I don't remember TypeScript at all. Now we're at the point where Quad Code writes, I think something like 80% of the code had Enthropic on average. I wrote maybe 10 20 p requests every day. Opus 4.5 and Quad Code wrote 100% of every single one. I didn't edit a single line manually. >> Andre Carpet posted that ...