The New SDLC With Vibe Coding — From ad-hoc prompting to Agentic Engineering
Google whitepaper (the "Day 1" installment of a series, by Addy Osmani, Shubham Saboo and Sokratis Kartakis) that maps the transformation of the software development lifecycle (SDLC) in the era of coding agents. Thesis: the fundamental shift is not a new language but the move from writing code to **expressing intent**. The document lays out a spectrum from *vibe coding* (prompting and accepting) to *agentic engineering* (AI implements under constraints, tests, and feedback loops designed by humans), with **context engineering** as the central skill, the **software factory** model (the developer's deliverable = the system that produces the code), **harness engineering** (Agent = Model + Harness), and a CapEx/OpEx economic analysis of total cost of ownership.
Addy Osmani · Shubham Saboo · Sokratis Kartakis (Google)