Andrew Kelley on Detecting LLM-Assisted Contributions

In a quotation collected by Simon Willison on April 30, 2026, Andrew Kelley, creator of the Zig programming language, argues that LLM-assisted contributions are easily distinguishable from human-made ones. He notes that LLM hallucinations differ fundamentally from human errors, making them detectable. Additionally, he observes that individuals accustomed to agentic coding exhibit a distinct "digital smell" noticeable to those who avoid such tools. Kelley compares this to the way non-smokers can identify smokers. He does not prohibit the use of LLMs but requests they not be used in his projects.