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

Re:Ask HN: How much better are AI IDEs vs. copy pasting into... by reidbarber on Thursday May 08, 2025 @10:30AM (#43926401)

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 bunch of different files.

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Re:Ask HN: How much better are AI IDEs vs. copy pasting into... by glohbalrob on Thursday May 08, 2025 @10:33AM (#43926440)

Just curious, why change the temp to 0

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Re:Ask HN: How much better are AI IDEs vs. copy pasting into... by reidbarber on Thursday May 08, 2025 @11:17AM (#43926917)

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).

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Re:Ask HN: How much better are AI IDEs vs. copy pasting into... by alanfranz on Thursday May 08, 2025 @10:55AM (#43926677)

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

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