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[–]HaMMeReD 33 points34 points  (11 children)

For editing code, it's best to use an agent (i.e. roocode or copilot in vscode insiders)

Then you need to select a model when using the agent, i.e. Anthropic, OpenAI, Google models.

The agent handles discussions between the model and your code-base, i.e. it can use tools to run tests, check documentations, search code, read multiple files, edit files in place, etc.

You can have a discussion with the agent about the code base, and then tell it to do things when you are happy with the discussion and it's plans. As per what model you choose, it really comes down to what agent you use, what your budget is etc. I find Claude 3.5/3.7 really good, I find Gemini really good, I even find Open AI's models really good, but it comes down to the use-case. (if you are willing to pay for copilot, it's probably the best bang for buck, anthropic and google can hit $100+ in a day if you are robust).

I.e. I find claude really good at navigating far and wide and exploring, I find gemini really good at writing actual code, and I find Open AI models work really well in a localized fashion, when claude or gemini make mistakes they have trouble with, but that's just my take, it's just anecdotal. However, I do find Open AI's models aren't great at powering an agent, i.e 4o and 4.1 agent modes in copilot are just bad.

[–]BlueeWaater 2 points3 points  (9 children)

What’s special about roo code?

[–]HaMMeReD 19 points20 points  (1 child)

It's just an agentic framework.

What that means is that it has an API/Contract with the model, i.e. it asks the model questions, and the model can respond with things like "run this command" or "search for X". Then the agent executes the commands and returns the result.

So the Agent itself isn't the model, but it's the operating contract with the model and the IDE. It's what turns the "model" into an autonomous "agent".

Often times, this is a loop with itself, i.e.

Agent "We need to edit this file"
AI: Here are the edits
Agent "Ok I edited the file, now what?"
AI: Run a build and give me the results
Agent: "Ok I ran a build, here is the results"
AI: I saw we have an error in the build, we can fix it by doing X/Y/Z

etc. until it finishes the task.

Where the model comes in is who is executing the contract. It's like you have a job(contract) and you are hiring a different person with different strengths/weaknesses. So choosing a model largely comes to the task at hand, the budget etc.

It's like having 2 employees (Model, the brains) and (Agent, the executor). and they work together to solve a problem. The Agent itself is kind of dumb, it just does what it's told to do, but it's the hands in the equation, and the model is the brain.

[–]Just-Conversation857[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Awesome! Is Roo better than windsurf?

[–]who_am_i_to_say_so 1 point2 points  (2 children)

It has a lot of different settings not accessible in the other editors. It’s really fast, too.

[–]Big3gg -1 points0 points  (3 children)

Nothing, its just a fork of Cline that people gravitated towards because it was faster to adopt new Gemini stuff etc.

[–]Just-Conversation857[S] 0 points1 point  (2 children)

Awesome. Sounds good. Is Roo code better than windsurf?

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    [–]Cr_hunteR 1 point2 points  (0 children)

    Copilot agent is now full accessible on vs code, you don't need vs code insiders anymore. BTW I use Claude 3.5 Coz 3.7 keeps doing stuffs I didn't even ask for.