Ask HN: What is your dev set up like?

Curious what HackerNews users are using right now. Mapping my IDE usage since 2022

Goland (2022-2024)-> Cursor(November 2024 to February 2026) -> Claude Code (& VSCode or Cursor for manual edits)

The Claude Code setup is interesting, I use the terminal or GitHub for diffs. I do open an editor to do manual edits, especially when I am doing something new( that the LLM hasn't been trained on) or debugging something.

Potential improvements

Stripe Projects ( creating API keys from CLI) as something that I have wanted in the past as with LLMs sometimes with a project the slowest part seems to be deployment / bringing all the keys. I also don't enjoy the fact that I can't push a job to the web when I am leaving work. Worktrees aren't fun as I can't run the services on different ports that easily for testing, further managing different TMUXs is painful. I am curious what tools people here are using, also what do people do while the LLM generates.

7 points | by break_the_bank 3 hours ago

9 comments

  • SamDc73 4 minutes ago
    in the last ~2 years:

    VSCode/GH copilot -> windsurf -> Zed/Claude code -> Zed/codex -> Zed/opencode -> Antigravity/opencode

    I'm only using antigravity cause they have good limits for now .. (but it we be matter of time before it will go away and then go back to Zed)

  • nazarewk 45 minutes ago
    I was running JetBrains suite since ~2010, but late 2025 I have switched to Helix inside Zellij + Jujutsu instead of git and not really looking back after. Took some getting used to, sometimes I miss the GUI, debugger and some of the more advanced tools, but I generally feel a lot more productive (especially in Nix/Go) with added responsiveness, can easily work on a much bulkier machine over SSH and have a real chance to learn the more universal built-in CLI/TUI tooling.
  • niyazpk 1 hour ago
    2024: I used to split time between IntelliJ IDEA (10% - for Java) and VSCode (90% - for everything else).

    2025: Stopped writing so much Java, so used VSCode exclusively for Python, TS etc, with Claude Code or Cline.

    2026: Time is split between Codex App (40%), Claude App (30%) and VSCode with Claude Code (30%).

    Some other thoughts:

    * Overall I feel like opening an IDE in the traditional sense is coming to an end.

    * Tech-stack wise I am much more open to trying out new things than before since LLMs will help with the setup and debugging.

    * For small teams like ours, code reviews are the bottleneck, and we constantly have to decide what code we review vs what we don't.

    * Building seems easy these days, but (1) so much competition no in every field, (2) much more product polish is expected than before, and (3) most products compete with Claude if they realize this or not.

  • mikewarot 1 hour ago
    When I'm writing my own code, it's Lazarus, based on Free Pascal. Or, the occasional dip into python with IDLE.

    When I'm using an LLM to generate technical debt, it's Visual Studio Code and GitHub's AI tool, that I can't remember the name of.

  • pickle-wizard 1 hour ago
    I am still using VSCode. I do have the Claude Code extension, but I don't really use Claude to write code. I mainly use it for code reviews. Since I am a solo developer it is nice to be able to get a second opinion.
  • hmokiguess 2 hours ago
    I miss spending time on vscode, these days I'm all in on terminal and claude, I've been contemplating slowing down again and going back to writing code not just specs and tests
  • maniacalrobot 1 hour ago
    Tmux … lots of tmux with lots of Claude code sessions
  • dingensundso 23 minutes ago
    vim
  • VoodooJuJu 1 hour ago
    [dead]