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Ask HN: How much better are AI IDEs vs. copy pasting into chat apps?

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Re: Ask HN: How much better are AI IDEs vs. copy pasting into chat apps?

#101

Post by mbreese »

I've been trying out Windsurf for the past two weeks with VS Code and I find it (and Copilot) very helpful, but also very annoying. Occasionally, the windsurf command overlays (explain, accept, etc...) will get stuck and make it impossible to see the code until I restart VS Code. But the biggest problem that I have is with automatic auto-complete. With both Windsurf and copilot, I have trouble figuring out when / if an autocompleted function or line of code will be accepted or generated. I'm still trying to figure out a good way to integrate my coding style with the tools, but I'm still trying because the work has been impressive thus far.

I'm now also trying the same with with Claude-code, which has been pretty useful too. It managed to figure out and explain a fairly technical code base (a few DNA processing algorithms). I haven't tried with with code I'm unfamiliar with yet.

So, my verdict so far: well worth the effort to try it and learn what's available. It's not that expensive to try. If it can help automate somethings (documentation and tests, for example), that's what I'm really hoping to use the AI assistants for. It works for actual coding too, but I still prefer to provide the main foundation.

Re: Ask HN: How much better are AI IDEs vs. copy pasting into chat apps?

#102

Post by alanfranz »

glohbalrob wrote: post #100
reidbarber wrote: post #99

My current favorite (and free) workflow: 1. Drop project files into https://files2prompt.com to copy a prompt with all file contents 2. Paste into https://aistudio.google.com/ and set a low (or 0) temperature and low top_p Since Gemini 2.5 Pro is free in AI Studio at the moment, and there's a 1M token limit, this works for most things I need. Cursor is better in some cases where I need a bunch of small edits across a…

Just curious, why change the temp to 0

You don’t want the model to stray or become too inventive when coding.

Re: Ask HN: How much better are AI IDEs vs. copy pasting into chat apps?

#103

Post by majora2007 »

I tried Cursor as I was excited it used Tree Maps for RAG. I tried it for 3 different medium asks on a medium sized project (https://github.com/Kareadita/Kavita).

I was extremely disappointed. It recreated enum files with the same values, tons of changes, overall I rolled back.

I use copy/paste into ChatGPT/Claude a lot. I will stick with that. I control the scope, I control what I copy or how I take the solutions.

I stand by my belief that AI cannot work on medium to large codebases. I know we see vibe coding as a trend, but those are usually greenfield applications.

Re: Ask HN: How much better are AI IDEs vs. copy pasting into chat apps?

#104

Post by PeterStuer »

Been experimenting with Roo-Code in VSCode on Sonnet 3.7, but my daily driver is ChatGTP.

I guess it's mostly because of my usage type, more 'explain these few lines of code' or 'write a short funcion for X' in Python or JS, not the 'create this complete app' I see people using the agentic approaches for.

OpenAI is mostly out of habit and because I have grinded out a high tier because I use it through the api in my production systems. With Anthropic I still run into throtteling, even though it's output seems better in terms of less halucinating.

Re: Ask HN: How much better are AI IDEs vs. copy pasting into chat apps?

#105

Post by reidbarber »

glohbalrob wrote: post #100
reidbarber wrote: post #99

My current favorite (and free) workflow: 1. Drop project files into https://files2prompt.com to copy a prompt with all file contents 2. Paste into https://aistudio.google.com/ and set a low (or 0) temperature and low top_p Since Gemini 2.5 Pro is free in AI Studio at the moment, and there's a 1M token limit, this works for most things I need. Cursor is better in some cases where I need a bunch of small edits across a…

Just curious, why change the temp to 0

I've found that to be best for coding, especially when you're describing the exact behavior you want implemented. Plus the format it returns is very consistent (not the case in the various chat UIs).

Re: Ask HN: How much better are AI IDEs vs. copy pasting into chat apps?

#107

Post by sepositus »

Ey7NFZ3P0nzAe wrote: post #56

I'm SO surprised to not see aider-chat everywhere mentionned. I've been using it for about a year and it's incredible. My take is that most people did not invest the little time necessary to get acustomed to its workflow. My advices for aider are: - familiarize yourself with the chat modes (architect, code, ask) - familiarize yourself with the edit modes (diff, whole, etc) and know which to use for a given model. Ind…

This is exactly how I use agent mode in Cursor. I’ve never understood why I would use aider. Am I missing something else?

Re: Ask HN: How much better are AI IDEs vs. copy pasting into chat apps?

#108

Post by SamDc73 »

I do prefer AI IDEs since they are easier to use, and most of them have agenetic mode so they automatically add relevant files to the context.

But sometimes, when I'm brainstorming ideas, planning a big feature, or thinking about an architecture change, I use a script to compress my codebase into one text file. I upload that to ChatGPT (usually O3 or O1 Pro) to ask theoretical questions, not to get it to write code.

Re: Ask HN: How much better are AI IDEs vs. copy pasting into chat apps?

#109

Post by SamDc73 »

Ey7NFZ3P0nzAe wrote: post #56

I'm SO surprised to not see aider-chat everywhere mentionned. I've been using it for about a year and it's incredible. My take is that most people did not invest the little time necessary to get acustomed to its workflow. My advices for aider are: - familiarize yourself with the chat modes (architect, code, ask) - familiarize yourself with the edit modes (diff, whole, etc) and know which to use for a given model. Ind…

Aider is to other AI tools what Vim/Neovim is to other IDEs. Super powerful, but with a learning curve most folks don’t want to climb.

Re: Ask HN: How much better are AI IDEs vs. copy pasting into chat apps?

#110

Post by SamDc73 »

olalonde wrote: post #10

I use Claude Code (cli tool) and it's on another level. Not even comparable to code autocomplete à la Copilot or copy/pasting into a LLM chat app. It knows about your whole code base, can use external tools, read documentation, run tests, etc. Even as an experienced developer, it's been a huge productivity boost. The main downside is that it can quickly get expensive.

Claude Code is by far the most expensive tool I used so far. I generally use it for fronted stuff since it's wonderful there !
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