The latest project from Linux and Git creator Linus Torvalds includes code that was “originally written by Vibe Coding,” but you shouldn’t read that as Torvalds taking that approach to anything and everything.
Torvalds sometimes works on small hobby projects during vacations. Last year he made guitar pedals. This year, he did some work on AudioNoise, which he calls “another silly guitar-pedal-related repo”. It creates random digital audio effects.
Torvalds revealed that he used AI coding tools in the README for the repo:
Also note that the Python visualizer tool is originally written by vibe-coding. I know more about analog filters—and this isn’t saying much—than I know about python. It started out as my typical “Google and monkey-see-monkey-do” type of programming, but then I cut out the middle-man-me and just used Google AntiGravity to do the audio sample visualizer.
Google’s AntiGravity is a fork of the AI-focused IDE Windsurf. They did not specify which model they used, but using antigravity suggests (but does not prove) that it was some version of Google’s Gemini.
Torvalds’ previous public comments on using large language model-based tools for programming have been more nuanced than many online discussions about it.
He introduced AI primarily as “a tool to help maintain code, including automated patch checks and code reviews”, citing examples of tools that have detected problems that they had missed.
On the other hand, he has also said that he generally has “little interest in AI for writing code” and has publicly stated that he is not anti-AI in principle, but he is opposed to too much hype about AI.
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