IDE Setup

Choose your development environment. All options work great with this boilerplate.

Which should I choose?

VS Code, The standard. Great if you use GitHub Copilot (Codex).
Cursor, Best AI integration. Fork of VS Code.
AntiGravity, Best for autonomous agentic workflows.
Claude Code, Best for terminal power users.

Prerequisites

Before configuring your IDE, ensure you have set up your development environment:

iOS Setup (macOS only)
Android Setup

You will need:

Node.js: Version 18 or newer
Git: For version control

Visual Studio Code

The industry standard code editor.

Installation

Download VS Code

Go to code.visualstudio.com.
Download and install for your OS.

Install Extensions

Open Extensions (Cmd+Shift+X or Ctrl+Shift+X) and install:

Expo Tools: Essential for debugging and config validation.
ES7+ React/Redux/React-Native snippets: Speed up coding.
Prettier: Code formatting.
GitHub Copilot: AI coding completion (powered by OpenAI Codex).
GitHub Copilot Chat: Chat with your codebase.

Configuration

Create a .vscode/settings.json (if not provided) to enforce formatting:

Json

{
  "editor.formatOnSave": true,
  "editor.defaultFormatter": "esbenp.prettier-vscode",
  "files.associations": {
    "*.css": "tailwindcss"
  }
}

Cursor

A VS Code fork with AI capabilities built-in. Best for developers already familiar with VS Code.

Installation

Download Cursor

Go to cursor.com
Click Download for Mac
Open the downloaded .dmg file
Drag Cursor to Applications

Open Cursor from Applications
Sign in with your account (or create one)
Complete the setup wizard

Download Cursor

Go to cursor.com
Click Download for Windows
Run the installer

Open Cursor
Sign in with your account
Complete the setup wizard

Download Cursor

Go to cursor.com
Download the AppImage file
Make it executable:

chmod +x Cursor-*.AppImage

Run the AppImage

Sign in with your account
Complete the setup wizard

Project Configuration

Create .cursorrules in your project root (already included in this boilerplate):

Markdown

# Project: AI Mobile Launcher

## Tech Stack
- React Native with Expo (SDK 54)
- TypeScript (strict mode)
- Redux Toolkit + RTK Query
- Restyle for styling

Windsurf

The world's first agentic IDE, powered by Codeium. It integrates deeply with your codebase ("Cascade").

Installation

Download from codeium.com/windsurf.

Cascade Flow

Cmd+I to open Cascade.
Ask it to "Explain this file" or "Refactor this component".

AntiGravity

An agentic IDE that can autonomously complete complex tasks with deep codebase understanding.

Installation

Download from antigravity.google.

Agentic Mode

AntiGravity's Agentic Mode can autonomously:

Read and understand your codebase
Make multi-file changes
Run terminal commands

To use Agentic Mode, press Cmd+L (Mac) or Ctrl+L (Windows/Linux).

Claude Code

A powerful CLI tool from Anthropic that brings Claude directly to your terminal.

Installation

npm install -g @anthropic-ai/claude-code

authenticate:

claude

Usage

Navigate to your project folder and start Claude:

cd your-project
claude

Next Steps

First App Launch, Clone and run the project

IDE Setup

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