Meta, the company that owns Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Threads, has released a new code-writing tool that goes by the name of Code Llama. This new tool was created on top of Meta’s Llama 2 large language model and is set to create new code and remove errors from human-written work.
According to Meta, Code Llama is able to create strings of code from prompts or complete and correct code mistakes. Apart from launchig the Code Llama, the company owned by Mark Zuckerberg also released Code Llama-Python (specialized in Phyton) and Code Llama-Instrct (it understands instructions in natural language). About the release of these new tools, Meta stated in a post:
“Programmers are already using LLMs to assist in a variety of tasks, ranging from writing new software to debugging existing code. The goal is to make developer workflows more efficient so they can focus on the most human-centric aspects of their jobs.”
These code generating tools have been handy for developers for some time now. For example, GitHub released Copilot, which is power by OpenAI’s GPT-4, to write and check code quickly. Additionally, Amazon’s AWS makes use of CodeWhisperer, which is a tool that can write checks and update codes. Also, Google has its own code-writing tool named AlphaCode, but it has not been oficially released.
Finally, Code Llama is going to use the same community license as Llama 2 previously did and will work free for doing research and commercial use.
