[dagss]

> from copying and pasting code into ChatGPT, to Copilot auto-completions [...], to Cursor, and finally the new breed of coding agent harnesses like Claude Code, Codex, Amp, Droid, and opencode

Reading HN I feel a bit out of touch since I seem to be "stuck" on Cursor. Tried to make the jump further to Claude Code like everyone tells me to, but it just doesn't feel right...

It may be due to the size of my codebase -- I'm 6 months into solo developer bootstrap startup, so there isn't all that much there, and I can iterate very quickly with Cursor. And it's mostly SPA browser click-tested stuff. Comparatively it feels like Claude Code spends an eternity to do something.

(That said Cursor's UI does drive me crazy sometimes. In particular the extra layer of diff-review of AI changes (red/green) which is not integrated into git -- I would have preferred that to instead actively use something integrated in git (Staged vs Unstaged hunks). More important to have a good code review experience than to remember which changes I made vs which changes AI made..)

[iterateoften]

For me cursor provides a much tighter feedback loop than Claude code. I can review revert iterate change models to get what I need. It feels sometimes Claude code is presented more as a yolo option where you put more trust on the agent about what it will produce.

I think the ability to change models is critical. Some models are better at designing frontend than others. Some are better at different programming languages, writing copy, blogs, etc.

I feel sabotaged if I can’t switch the models easily to try the same prompt and context across all the frontier options

[cjonas]

Same. For actual productions app I'm typically reviewing the thinking messages and code changes as they happen to ensure it stays on the rails. I heavily use the "revert" to previous state so I can update the prompt with more accurate info that might have come out of the agents trial and error. I find that if I don't do this, the agent makes a mess that often doesn't get cleaned up on its way to the actually solution. Maybe a similar workflow is possible with Claude Code...

[sibellavia]

Probably an ideal compromise solution for you would be to install the official Claude Code extension for VS Code, so you have an IDE for navigating large, complex codebases while still having CC integration.

[mkreis]

Bootstrapped solo dev here. I enjoyed using Claude to get little things done which I happed on my TODO list below the important stuff, like updating a landing page, or in your case perhaps adding automated testing for the frontend stuff (so you don't have to click yourself). It's just nice having someone coming up with a proposal on how to implement something, even it's not the perfect way, it's good as a starter. Also I have one Claude instance running to implement the main feature, in a tight feedback loop so that I know exactly what it's doing. Yes, sometimes it takes a bit longer, but I use the time checking what the other Claudes are doing...

[andai]

Claude Code spends most of its time poking around the files. It doesn't have any knowledge of the project by default (no file index etc), unless they changed it recently.

When I was using it a lot, I created a startup hook that just dumped a file listing into the context, or the actual full code on very small repos.

I also got some gains from using a custom edit tool I made which can edit multiple chunks in multiple files simultaneously. It was about 3x faster. I had some edge cases where it broke though, so I ended up disabling it.

[leerob]

> in particular the extra layer of diff-review of AI changes (red/green) which is not integrated into git

We're making this better very soon! In the coming weeks hopefully.

[dagss]

That's great news.

I see in your public issue tracker that a lot of people are desperate simply for an option to turn that thing off ("Automatically accept all LLM changes"). Then we could use any kind of plugin really for reviews with git.

[SatvikBeri]

Seems like there's a speed/autonomy spectrum where Cursor is the fastest, Codex is the best for long-running jobs, and Claude is somewhere in the middle.

Personally, I found Cursor to be too inaccurate to be useful (possibly because I use Julia, which is relatively obscure) – Opus has been roughly the right level for my "pair programming" workflow.

[dagss]

I mainly use Opus as well, Cursor isn't tied to any AI model and both Opus and Sonnet and a lot of others are available. Of course there's differences in how the context is managed, but Opus is usually amazing in Cursor at least.

I will very quickly @- the parts of the code that are relevant to get the context up and running right away. Seems in Claude that's harder..

(They also have their own, "Composer 1", which is just lightning fast compared to the others...and sometimes feels as smart as Opus, but now and then don't find the solution if it's too complicated and I have to ask Opus to clean it up. But if there's simple stuff I switch to it.)

[pests]

> remember which changes I made vs which changes AI made..

They are improving this use case too with their enhanced blame. I think it was mentioned in their latest update blog.

You'll be able to hover over lines to see if you wrote it, or an AI. If it was an AI, it will show which model and a reference to the prompt that generated it.

I do like Cursor quite a lot.

[dagss]

Sounds good, but also need an option to auto-approve all the changes in their local "replica of git".

(if one already exists, someone needs to tell the public Cursor issue tracker)