Software Engineering
Under Changing Constraints
How lower-cost generation creates second-order changes across people, organizations, delivery, security, and economics.
System overview
Generation abundance redistributes constraints.
Scarcity moves into understanding, verification, and deployment.
Cheap production shifts pressure into context, architecture, review, release capacity, security, and judgment.
clear intent & acceptancegeneration abundancechange-volume surgeparallel solution searchagentic change bundlessoftware sprawlevidence-ready generation
review-capacity gapchange impact & release safetyAI-assisted reviewattention routingindependent verificationaccountable acceptance
human judgment & learningfoundational skill decaycognitive offloadingmental-model driftautomation biastask stewardshipAI-supported learning
context, architecture & reuseshared ontology & knowledge graphstale-context riskarchitecture alignmentownership & provenancegoverned reuse
AI & software supply chainattack-surface expansioninsecure change at scaleprompt & tool injectionagent privilege misuseAI-enabled defensecontinuous validation
capacity & prioritiestoken & compute budgetsverification capacitydeployment capacitycost per accepted changevalue-based prioritizationworkforce rebalancing
01Generation
abundanceintent · options · volume
abundanceintent · options · volume
TODAY'S FOCUS02Verification
& trustimpact · evidence · acceptance
& trustimpact · evidence · acceptance
03Human
judgmentlearn · challenge · intervene
judgmentlearn · challenge · intervene
04Org context
& reuseontology · architecture · reuse
& reuseontology · architecture · reuse
06Cyber
securitysupply chain · integrity · defense
securitysupply chain · integrity · defense
07Value
& capacitytokens · review · deployment
& capacitytokens · review · deployment
01 / 07
Generation abundance
AI makes candidate changes cheap to produce. Review becomes the first visible bottleneck.
A queueing model of software delivery
Generation speed is not delivery speed. Every stage has its own capacity.
REVIEW QUEUE321 checks waitingREVIEW FASTER
SIZELOWGROWTHSTABLE
CUSTOMERPR-1423 commits
DEFECTPR-1432 commits
SECURITYPR-1445 commits
CONTROLPR-1451 commit
DATAPR-1464 commits
PLATFORMPR-1472 commits
ARCH DEBTPR-1486 commits
TAIL · NEWEST ARRIVALPR-145
HEAD · NEXT TO REVIEWPR-143
3 PRs queued
PR-1423 commits grouped
01INTENTdesired outcome
02CHANGE FACTScode + dependencies
03BEHAVIORexpected result
04BLAST RADIUSsystem impact
05SECURITYsupply chain
06INDEPENDENT CHECKseparate evidence
07OWNER + ROLLBACKsafe to operate
← → POSITION · ↑ TURN · ↓ RELEASE
accepted changeready · monitored · reversible
ACTUAL FLOWcommits→pull request→review queue→seven evidence checks→merge
Research and operating agenda
Seven areas for AI-assisted software delivery
Andrey
Tapekha
LinkedInlinkedin.com/in/andreytapekha