CS146S: The Modern Software Developer
by Stanford University (Mihail Eric)
Stanford's course on building software with coding agents: lectures, guest talks and assignments, all public
Overview
CS146S: The Modern Software Developer is a 3-unit Stanford University course taught by Mihail Eric, a Stanford AI PhD, former Amazon Alexa technical lead and YC founder, on how coding LLMs change every stage of the software development life cycle. Course materials are public at themodernsoftware.dev, and the weekly assignments live in the mihail911/modern-software-dev-assignments GitHub repository (about 4,000 stars and 950 forks; Python 3.12 with Poetry). The Fall 2025 run followed ten weeks: LLMs and AI coding foundations; anatomy of a coding agent; AI IDEs and context engineering (guest Silas Alberti, Cognition); coding agent patterns (Boris Cherny, Anthropic); the modern terminal (Zach Lloyd, Warp); AI testing and security (Isaac Evans, Semgrep); code review and software support (Tomas Reimers, Graphite); automated app building (Gaspar Garcia, Vercel); post-deployment operations (Resolve AI); and the future of AI software engineering (Martin Casado, a16z). Hands-on assignments include building an MCP server from scratch, running agents from a design document, shipping a checkpointed feature and security-scanning your own code. The Fall 2026 edition, now listed on the site, frames the syllabus around MCP, agent skills, spec-driven development, loop engineering and the software factory. Stated prerequisites are CS111/CS161-level programming, with CS221/229 recommended.
At a Glance
- Topic
- Agentic
- Level
- Intermediate
- Format
- Course
- Cost
- Free
- Duration
- 10-week course; ~10-15 hours for the core weeks or ~25-30 hours for a full self-paced pass
- Provider
- Stanford University (Mihail Eric)
- Hands-on
- Yes — code/exercises
- Certificate
- None
What You’ll Learn
- ✓Explain how a coding agent works internally, from the underlying LLM to its tool loop
- ✓Engineer context for AI IDEs and agents using project context files like CLAUDE.md
- ✓Build a Model Context Protocol server from scratch and connect it to an agent
- ✓Drive a coding agent from a design document and ship a checkpointed feature
- ✓Run AI security scanners on your own code and judge their high false-positive rates
- ✓Place AI correctly in the code-review hierarchy and use it for software support
- ✓Automate app building and post-deployment operations such as runbook automation with AI agents
Highlights
- •Guest lectures from people building the tools themselves: Anthropic, Cognition, Warp, Semgrep, Graphite, Vercel and a16z
- •Public assignment repository with about 4,000 stars and 950 forks, runnable locally with Python 3.12 and Poetry
- •Honest about limits: the security week puts AI scanning's false-positive problem (cited as 82-86%) front and centre
- •Fall 2026 edition adds agent skills, spec-driven development and loop engineering, so the syllabus is kept current
- •An independent study guide warns some material ages fast (terminal tools, app-builder platforms) and recommends focusing on weeks 3, 4 and 6-7
Who It’s For
Best For
- ✓Working developers already using coding agents who want a structured mental model
- ✓Engineering leads defining AI-assisted development practices for their team
- ✓CS students preparing for AI-native software engineering roles
- ✓Engineers building MCP servers and agent tooling
Prerequisites
- •CS111/CS161-level programming experience (the assignments use Python)
- •CS221/CS229 machine learning background recommended but not required
- •Some familiarity with git, the terminal and an AI coding tool such as Claude Code or Cursor
FAQ
What is CS146S: The Modern Software Developer?
CS146S: The Modern Software Developer is Stanford's free-to-follow course on AI-native software development, aimed at working developers and CS students who code alongside LLM agents. Afterwards you can engineer context for coding agents, build an MCP server, gate agent output with security scanning and code review, and automate post-deployment operations.
Is CS146S: The Modern Software Developer free?
CS146S: The Modern Software Developer is free to access.
What level is CS146S: The Modern Software Developer for?
CS146S: The Modern Software Developer is aimed at a intermediate audience. Recommended background: CS111/CS161-level programming experience (the assignments use Python), CS221/CS229 machine learning background recommended but not required, Some familiarity with git, the terminal and an AI coding tool such as Claude Code or Cursor.
How long does CS146S: The Modern Software Developer take?
Expect roughly 10-week course; ~10-15 hours for the core weeks or ~25-30 hours for a full self-paced pass. Most learners work through it at their own pace.
What will I learn from CS146S: The Modern Software Developer?
You'll learn: Explain how a coding agent works internally, from the underlying LLM to its tool loop; Engineer context for AI IDEs and agents using project context files like CLAUDE.md; Build a Model Context Protocol server from scratch and connect it to an agent; Drive a coding agent from a design document and ship a checkpointed feature; Run AI security scanners on your own code and judge their high false-positive rates; Place AI correctly in the code-review hierarchy and use it for software support; Automate app building and post-deployment operations such as runbook automation with AI agents.
Topics
Sources
This page was written from 6 sources, 4 on domains other than themodernsoftware.dev.