Project workspaces, not product names
By the time you read this, at least one of the tools in this lesson has probably rebranded, been acquired, or spawned a competitor with a better logo. That's fine. Chapter zero introduced the category — AI project workspaces and agentic coding tools — and the category is the part worth learning. Brand names change; the shape doesn't.
Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, Aider, OpenCode, and whatever launches next week all wrap the same basic layers around a model:
- project files
- tool access
- system instructions
- conversation history
- diffs
- commands
- tests
- permission boundaries
- recovery checkpoints
That harness is why the same model feels different in a chat tab than in a project workspace. In chat, the model gives you an answer. In a workspace, it can inspect files, propose edits, run checks, and leave behind a diff you can review.
So the durable skill isn't memorizing one product. It's reading the harness:
- What can the agent see?
- What can it change?
- What tools can it call?
- What proof does it produce?
- Where can I undo?
- What should I never let it do automatically?
Answer those six questions and switching tools becomes annoying instead of existential. You understand the category.