ChatGPT (AI) Guide for Developers. Everything you need to know

ChatGPT assists everyone, but it can significantly make your work easy as a developer. This ChatGPT (AI) guide explains how to make the most of it.

ChatGPT (AI) Guide for Developers

Daniel Guajardo

Chief Executive Officer

Andres Rodriguez

CMO at Instagantt

Almost everyone is talking about ChatGPT and how it makes their job easier. While it just provides sets of instructions for other professionals, if you are a developer, ChatGPT can do much more than that for you. So, if you want to benefit from the full potential that ChatGPT holds, make sure to try everything included in the ChatGPT (AI) guide for developers.

ChatGPT (AI) Guide for Developers: Top Ways to Improve Your Efficiency.

You are not right if you think that ChatGPT is something magical that will create your websites or mobile apps with a single command. It just needs a little more input from your end, and it will make development significantly simpler for you. This ChatGPT (AI) guide for developers includes all you can get done with ChatGPT with minimal input and effort.

1. Generating the desired code sections by specifying requirements.

You cannot ask ChatGPT to create an app like Facebook and expect it to provide everything, including the source code. However, you can divide the whole project into smaller chunks and ask it to write specific code sections. That ChatGPT can do well, and some example questions you can try are:

·   Write a C++ code that can tell the age of a person by asking about their birthday

·   Python code to connect the app with the database backend

It will give you the right code along with basic information and an explanation of the code. You can incorporate it into your project, and a new feature will be successfully implemented.

2. Asking it to write documentation for your software.

Documentation takes a lot of time for developers. While it only involves specifying the code and working as an easily understandable technical text, it is not the most attractive thing for developers. With ChatGPT, you can make this part of your project very simple.

The most effective way is by providing a piece of code for a specific part of the project and asking it to create the documentation. Within no time, you will have the documentation for your whole project.

3. Writing your test case list with ChatGPT.

Testing is essential for any project or update, and you must use different test cases with every piece of code. Things get simple as you introduce ChatGPT to this issue. If you are using the right programming conventions, you can ask ChatGPT to give you the right list of test cases for that function.

Otherwise, you can ask it to give the input values and expected passing or failing outcomes for a specific function. It can identify the logic behind the code and give you the right test cases.

4. Debugging your or someone else’s code with it.

Debugging your code is hard, and debugging someone else's code is even harder. Developers usually find it annoying, especially when code is written complexly. However, with the help of ChatGPT, debugging has become easier than ever.

If you come across a code with a bug, paste it into ChatGPT and ask it to debug the code. ChatGPT will apply different debugging strategies as recommended and give you the right actions to find or even correct the bugs found. So, hours of debugging work can be done within minutes.

5. Getting an explanation for a code.

Say that a piece of code is perfectly written and contains no bugs. You can still not get the idea of that code for multiple reasons. So, if you have a code that you want to understand, but there is nobody to explain, ask ChatGPT.

You will need to paste that code in ChatGPT, and asking for an explanation will give you everything you need to know about that code. In fact, this line-by-line explanation of code will be much more effective.

6. Simplifying code

A code can be complex in 2 ways. The first one is that it is complex for humans, and the second is when its computational complexity is bigger. There are cases where you cannot tolerate the complexity of a code, so you need to simplify it. The good thing about development is that one task can be achieved with multiple codes.

So, pasting that piece of code in ChatGPT and asking it to simplify the code will make things very simple for you. Now the code will become efficient in terms of hardware utilization, and it will also be easier to understand,

7. Generating alternative pieces of code for the same task.

Sometimes you need to write code for some tasks, but it comes with some requirements. For example, you cannot use a specific line of code in that task. Multiple types of code can be used to achieve the same task. Giving ChatGPT the code and asking it to give you the alternate for that code with the same result will make things easy.

Whether you don’t know the latest programming standards or have some restrictions on coding, ChatGPT will make things much easier for you.

8. Using it for research purposes

You must research multiple things before writing code as you get a project. The research can include the following:

·   General knowledge about the project

·   Best coding practices

·   Right platform and languages for the project, etc.

Doing this research from documentation may take a very long time, and the same is true with the internet. However, with ChatGPT, you get solid information against your question, making research very simple.

9. Asking it to give use cases for a specific project or idea.

A developer can consider a project when they complete all the functional and non-functional requirements. The same applies to the use cases since you must add all the features. For example, if you are developing an app like YouTube, you must know all the use cases to include in the project. So, instead of listing all by yourself, ask ChatGPT about the use cases, and it will instantly list all of them for you.

10.  Finding any security vulnerability in your code.

Security has become an essential requirement of every type of code, but sometimes developers fail to meet all the security demands. Now finding any possible security vulnerabilities in your code has become easy since you can learn about them and paste your code to get it checked by ChatGPT. After studying your code, it will tell you what type of attacks may be possible on your code.

11.  Writing appropriate data parsing algorithms

Tools for parsing data are already available, but things will improve if you add this feature as a built-in option in your project. So, give ChatGPT some sample data like “serial number-name-address-city-contact number” and ask it how you can parse that data. Once it creates the algorithm, ask it to write code for that algorithm in the required programming language, and you will be done.

Apart from all these things, ChatGPT can help developers manage projects, meet deadlines and schedule tasks along with their communication needs.

Limitations to ChatGPT you must be very careful about.

ChatGPT might help you with many things, but it also comes with certain limitations. So, before you start using all the tips from ChatGPT (AI) guide for developers, check out these limitations and create your backup plan accordingly.

1. It can give incorrect answers.

Currently, it is possible for ChatGPT to give incorrect answers. In the worst case, an answer can be wrong, and ChatGPT may provide supporting ideas for the wrong answer, and it is because it is in the early stages.

2. Answers to unclear questions can be misleading.

ChatGPT will assume the question and give you the answer if you ask an unclear question instead of asking for more details. The answer will be great if it assumes the right direction. However, it can be very misleading the other way around.

3. Redundancy in information

ChatGPT is prone to creating redundancies in information. It can repeat certain details in one answer. Moreover, it can give the same answers to different questions with little similarity. That is unacceptable when you are using it for generating text.

Conclusion

ChatGPT is among the best things that have happened to developers. Whether you are looking to better understand some concept or want help on some piece of code that you have been stuck on for so long, ChatGPT is the perfect choice for you.

The best part is that you can do a lot more than these 2 things, as mentioned above in the ChatGPT (AI) guide for developers. With the power of artificial intelligence training, ChatGPT can revolutionize the development and software engineering field.

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