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Cover image for ✨ Cursor AI Editor — Is It Actually Useful?

✨ Cursor AI Editor — Is It Actually Useful?

Best Codes on September 10, 2024

Hi guys! You might have heard a lot about Cursor — an editor like VS Code with AI built-in! In this article, I'll discuss what I think about Curso...
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Rafał Goławski

Well, Cursor is nice to play around with for a while, but in the long term I'll stick to VS Code and Copilot. It's more than enough for me.

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Best Codes

That's basically how I feel (though I don't have Copilot). I've heard that Copilot is fantastic, but haven't tried it yet…

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best_codes profile image
Best Codes

Hey guys!
Be sure to share AI tools you love with me. I'll check them out and let you know what I think!

Note: I'll also check out AI tools you made. A.K.A., self-promotion is accepted. 😀

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Red Ochsenbein (he/him)

Does it have VIM keybindings? No? Okay, next...

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The Eagle 🦅

It's a fork of VSCode, so you can use the TS plugin of VIM that MS made inside VSCode.

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syeo66 profile image
Red Ochsenbein (he/him) • Edited

VSC does not really sound convincing to me.

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best_codes profile image
Best Codes

Why not?

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syeo66 profile image
Red Ochsenbein (he/him) • Edited
  1. Electron
  2. Microsoft
  3. Bloat
  4. Slow, sluggish software

(And towards Cursor: 5. AI, I mean my employer would not like me sending all our code to a random company out there)

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best_codes profile image
Best Codes

In my experience, VS Code has actually been pretty fast. I do think it could probably be fast if it didn't use Electron, but it works for me and is quite easy to debug.

Number 2 is a valid point... 😂

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Best Codes

Not only that, but you can choose the default keyboard shortcuts to use when you first install the program. :D

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best_codes profile image
Best Codes

I believe it does! :D

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Alternate Existance

Nooooo ;( I hate VIM lol...

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bethwickerson

I just VSCode and CoPilot for a while, but I switched to Cursor shortly after it came out. I thought it was great for a long time, I love the integrated Chat versus auto-complete. That is until recently it seemed less and less helpful. I think it may have something to do with using GPT API keys instead of paying for a plan with Cursor, but so many times I would ask for help with issues and it would give me the exact same code that I had explained was bugging.

I have switched back to VSCode, partly because of what many others have said about long-term stability. Cursor is really just a fork of VS Code, and I have heard great things about Claude Dev. It seems to be a great improvement so far and includes the built-in chat!

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Best Codes

Yes, there are a lot of concerns about stability.

Claude Dev is great! Personally, I prefer Codeium, which is completely free and has unlimited AI chat and autocompletions. There are a number of other awesome options, like Pieces, Copilot, Tabnine, etc.

Thanks for commenting!

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Alternate Existance

Claude Dev is awesome :D

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Jeremy Smith

I installed it on two machines and it caused boot issues on both, I had to reinstall Ubuntu and lost two sets of local data / had to setup my machines again.

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Best Codes

Not good! 😬
I had to start the .appimage file with --no-sandbox in the terminal to even get it working, and I had a lot of other problems that I haven't proven aren't just specific to my device or caused by Cursor, so I didn't include them in my post.

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Jeremy Smith

Yeah same, instant crash and boot issues on work laptop then stupidly I tried on my personal I had 2 mins with it and it looked great but then it crashed and I had to use usb for reinstall of Ubuntu.

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Best Codes

🙁

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rmr32 profile image
rmr32

Switched to Cursor about two weeks ago on a Garuda Linux. It actually helped with some problems I couldn't solve on my own. Installed easy and haven't had issues. I was going to continue with a paid subscription, but now intrigued by Codeium.

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Best Codes

Try both and let me know what you think!

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Sacha Wharton

I gave it go and it is great but I had to give up using it as it locked up my Macbook Pro M2 to the point I had to hard reboot my machine. I will stick with VS Code and Codium.

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Best Codes

Thanks for the feedback! It sounds like a lot of people are having problems with Cursor crashing.
There is a difference between Codium and Codeium. Just curious, which one do you use?

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sachajw profile image
Sacha Wharton

Oh, I just learnt something, thank you very much. I thought I made a typo. I have now installed Codeium. Much appreciated for your response, :-) otherwise I would never have known.

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best_codes profile image
Best Codes

No problem! They're both AI tools, but different all the same. :D

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tq-bit

Codeium all the way imho

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Best Codes

😀 Yup!

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pat-hubbs

I enjoyed using Cursor for a week or so, but switched back to VSCode as Cursor was a bit too sluggish for my liking

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Best Codes

Interesting. I hadn't noticed any sluggishness, but I didn't try too many intensive processes or anything.

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Alternate Existance

What was sluggish, I had not too many issues...

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Jotty John

Interesting article!

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best_codes profile image
Best Codes

Thank you!

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wrongsideofthetracks profile image
Alex Bertalan

According to Cursor documentation it does not have unlimited code autocompletions.
Free users receive 2000 suggestions at no cost. Pro and Business plans receive unlimited suggestions.
I used it for a few days and loved their autocompletion feature and wondered why it stopped cause I didn't got any notifications.

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best_codes profile image
Best Codes

Thanks for pointing this out! I addressed the problem in my post.

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dhengghuring profile image
Ridho

This is cool code editor i wil try later, thanks bro

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Best Codes

Your welcome; be sure to let me know how it turns out!

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bethwickerson

v0 is a super smart tool for Next, Three, React. I wish there was an extension to use in VSCode

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Best Codes

v0.dev is pretty great, I wish you could do more for free though...

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Dror Wayne

You should check out Fine. For serious developers doing more than just building a web app from scratch, it puts cursor to shame.

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Best Codes

I develop most of my projects solo, but this looks like it would be super useful if I had a team! Thanks for sharing!

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alt_exist profile image
Alternate Existance

Oooh looks nice :D

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expressa profile image
Expressa

Awesome post!

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Best Codes

Thank you!

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Rob Benzo

I like Pieces

pieces.app/

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Best Codes

Thanks for checking this out, Rob!

I've tried Pieces as well, and I also love it! The VS Code extension was a bit laggy, so I don't use it too much anymore.
Thanks for sharing!

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Ananya Paw 🐾

for simple stuff yes, if you are too lazy to copy it from chatgpt, claude

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Alternate Existance

I tried Cursor and it was ok, but I agree that vs code seems more stable; also didn't realize the free plan isnt unlimited :(

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