You Need to Try Cursor, the New AI IDE and Code Editor
Github Copilot is amazing and of course we’ve all been riding high on it for almost a year now. But it’s not quite perfect and it certainly doesn’t do a great job existing code. On top of that it’s not the best “rubber duck” (if you aren’t familiar with the development term check it out) and you may find yourself workshopping ideas with ChatGPT and flipping back and forth.
How Is It Superior To GitHub Copilot?
Well, for one, it is inlined in the IDE (integrated development environment) just like Copilot so its a competitive feature. But it isn’t necessarily that you want one or the other at the moment. The big difference is that Cursor allows you to highlight code and use the keystroke Command + K to open up a prompt textbox. This prompt textbox will call to GPT voa API for code completion and use the current selection as the context
That alone would be a differentiator on Copilot as Github Copilot was a trailblazing product but lacks the ability to edit code well. You can tell Cursor was made by devs for devs because the responses from Cursor are inlined in to your code as a diff and you can choose to Accept or Reject the diff. That’s essential for editing existing code which is most code. This is really why Cursor can call themselves and AI-first code editor.
So It is Different Than Github Copilot?
Yes! It offers a lot of features that Copilot is missing and directly wires ChatGPT in to the IDE. By pressing Command + L you open a chat window where you can discuss the current code with ChatGPT. This is huge vs. the copy and paste routine many of us have been going through to discuss code with ChatGPT. One of the greatest parts is just being able to open a prompt and ask, prior to this you had to write a bunch of comments in for Github Copilot to act on.
How Expensive? What Is The Price of Cursor IDE?
Not bad honestly. You can use your own OpenAI API Key and they give you some calls for free every month. I went through my free calls all in one day because I was trying it out and trying to put it through its paces but its been excellent. If you want this kind of inline AI IDE action (and you do) then what they are offering right now is great.
Is It Tough To Migrate From VSCode?
NO. I was so stoked on this part. All of my extensions and everything from VSCode imported automatically and magically it all worked. Not even joking, actually happened. All of your VSCode Settings and Extensions and workflows should move over nicely
Are They Paying You For This Review?
No but they should be.
What Went Wrong? What is Wrong With Cursor?
I am not a huge fan of the default color palette. Very weird, the highlighting being the color of the background for collapsed code blocks is just unusual.
I also had to rebind the command that triggers the calls to GPT. At first Command + K did nothing for me; then I checked the keybindings in VSCode and that was already the keystrokes for 6 other commands. I do not frequently use Cmd + Shift + K so I rebound that as it only has 1 one other keybinding.
My Org Is Big On Code Security…
Sorry, this is not the product for you… at work.
What Is The Link To Download It Again?
EXACTLY. You need this in your toolchain as a developer. I’ve already switched over to using it as my primary IDE. Click here to get Cursor and start using AI assisted development right now.