📓How to use AI as a developer?
@Rohanhandore
What are the best AI code tools in 2024?
Update: April 20th, 2024 - Added Meta Llama 3 and MetaGPT
AI coding tools are becoming standard practice for many developers. And today, you’ll learn which code generators are the best ones out there for creating high-quality code with the help of artificial intelligence.
Want to learn more? Read on!
Is it possible to code with AI tools?
Yes, it is possible to code with AI tools. In fact, leveraging AI tools for coding is not only possible, but it can also significantly enhance productivity and accuracy.
AI code is code written by artificial intelligence (AI), often times utilizing large language models (LLMs). These AI programs can write their own programs or translate from one programming language to another. They also perform tasks like offering assistance in auto-generating documentation and finding code snippets faster.
One of the most popular tools is Open AI’s Codex, an AI system that translates natural language to code. Codex powers GitHub Copilot, another popular AI code tool.
OpenAI Codex is capable of interpreting simple commands in natural language and carrying them out for the programmer. This makes it possible to build on top of the existing application with a natural language interface.
As a general-purpose programming model, OpenAI Codex can be applied to almost any programming task. That said, the tool is in beta and so results will vary.
AlphaCode by DeepMind is another tool that is shaking up the industry. Interestingly, this tool outperforms human coders in certain situations. You see, AlphaCode outperformed 45% of programmers in coding competitions with at least 5,000 participants.
However, there are problems with code generators, too. That's why AI coding tools are used to help developers become more productive and efficient, rather than to replace them entirely.
For example, a Stanford-affiliated research team found that engineers who use AI tools are more likely to cause security vulnerabilities in their apps. Plus, questions around copyright are not entirely resolved.
In other words, AI code tools are not yet completely safe to use. That said, the popularity of these tools means that they can’t be overlooked.
What is AI code written in?
AI code is written in languages supported by the AI code generator. For example, OpenAI Codex is most fluent in Python but is also quite capable in several languages, including JavaScript, Ruby, and TypeScript.
Now, let’s take a look at the best code generators out there.
The best AI code generators and AI development tools
What are some effective AI code generators? The most popular ones include OpenAI Codex, Copilot by Github, ChatGPT by OpenAI as well as open-source models such as Llama 3.
But there are plenty of other tools out there. I’ve listed them here below, including their features, capabilities, and which companies are behind them. Let’s dive in!
Here are the best AI code generators of 2024.
1. OpenAI Codex
OpenAI Codex is the most prominent AI code tool available today. It’s based on OpenAI's LLMs (GPT-3 and GPT-4) and is trained on billions of lines of code. The tool is proficient in more than a dozen programming languages.
As of March 2023, the Codex models are now deprecated. Check out the new Chat models, which are capable of handling many coding tasks with similar capabilities.
Price: No information available
2. Copilot
Copilot uses publicly available code from GitHub repositories so that users can access large datasets and quickly develop accurate code. The tool detects errors in code and recommends changes to it. You can start using GitHub Copilot by installing one of the extensions in your preferred environment.
Price: $10-$19 - GitHub Copilot is free to use for verified students, teachers, and maintainers of popular open source projects.
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3. ChatGPT (GPT-3/4)
Created by OpenAI, the AI chatbot ChatGPT has become hugely popular, and finding different ways to use it has become a major trend. By taking advantage of transformers, ChatGPT can broaden its contextual awareness and sound very human-like. It has a wider scope of responses and can even generate code. But just like with any other AI tool, ChatGPT code might include bugs, be difficult to maintain, include security vulnerabilities, and so on. As already mentioned, AI code tools are still no replacement for human developers, even if they can be incredibly helpful in speeding up the process.
GPT-4, OpenAI's latest AI model, is a multimodal tool that excels in programming tasks. It understands and explains code, writes new code, and outperforms existing models on Python coding tasks. Despite its ability to handle complex tasks, it has limitations like reasoning errors and potential security vulnerabilities in the code it produces.
Price: Free or $20 for GPT Plus
4. AlphaCode
Another AI-based code generator is Google-backed DeepMind’s AlphaCode, which gives developers access to source code from various language libraries. With AlphaCode, developers can leverage thousands of pre-made libraries, helping them connect and use third-party APIs quickly and easily. AlphaCode is not yet available to the public.
Price: No information available
5. Tabnine
Tabnine is an AI code completion tool that utilizes deep learning algorithms to provide the user with intelligent code completion capabilities. Tabnine supports several programming languages such as Java, Python, C++, and more. This tool is open-source and is used by leading tech companies like Facebook and Google.
Price: Paid plans start from $12/month per seat
6. CodeT5
CodeT5 is an open AI code generator that helps developers to create reliable and bug-free code quickly and easily. It is also open-source and provides support for various programming languages such as Java, Python, and JavaScript. CodeT5 also has an online version as well as an offline version for data security.
Price: Free
7. Polycoder
Polycoder is an open-source alternative to OpenAI Codex. It is trained on a 249 GB codebase written in 12 programming languages. With Polycoder, users can generate code for web applications, machine learning, natural language processing and more. It is well-regarded amongst programmers because of its capability of generating code quickly.
Price: Free
8. Deepcode
DeepCode is a cloud-based AI code analysis tool that automatically scans the codebase of a project and identifies potential bugs and vulnerabilities. It offers support for multiple languages such as Java, Python, and JavaScript. DeepCode is well-regarded for its accurate bug detection.
Price: No information available
9. WPCode
WPCode is an AI-driven WordPress code generator created by Isotropic. It supports both developers and non-technical WordPress creators, allowing them to quickly generate high-quality code snippets. CodeWP supports not only HTML and CSS but languages such as Java and Python. It even includes AI assistants to suggest improvements to code snippets.
Price: Starting at $49
10. AskCodi
AskCodi is a code generator that offers a full suite of development tools to help developers build and ship projects faster. With its AI-based code generation, it helps developers write better code and shorter code blocks, with fewer mistakes. AskCodi can be used to develop both web and mobile applications.
Price: Paid plans start from $7.99/month per seat
11. Codiga
Codiga is a static analysis tool that ensures code is secure and efficient. It supports popular languages like JavaScript, Python, Ruby, Kotlin, and more. With Codiga, you can test your code for vulnerabilities and security issues in real time. It also includes an auto-fixer to quickly address any issues in the code.
Price: Paid plans start from $14/month per seat
Visual Studio IntelliCode is an extension of the Visual Studio Code editor created by Microsoft that provides AI-assisted development experiences to improve developer productivity. It offers smarter IntelliSense completions and helps reduce the amount of time developers spend navigating and debugging code.
Price: Starting from $45/month
13. PyCharm
PyCharm is an AI code completion tool from JetBrains which provides developers with intelligent code completion capabilities. This tool supports various programming languages such as Java, Python, and JavaScript. PyCharm is well regarded for its accuracy and can help developers reduce the amount of time spent on coding tasks.
Price: Starting from $24.90/month per seat
14. AIXcoder
AIXcoder is an AI-powered programming pair designed to aid development teams in writing code. It supports languages such as Java, Python, and JavaScript. This tool also offers a range of features such as automated routine tasks, AI-powered code completion, real-time code analysis and error checks while typing.
Price: No information available
15. Ponicode
Ponicode is an AI-powered code assistant designed to help developers optimize their coding workflow. It uses natural language processing and machine learning to generate code from user-defined descriptions. The tool is maintained by CircleCI.
Price: No information available
16. Jedi
Jedi is an open-source option for code completion in AI. It mostly functions as a plugin for editors and IDEs that use Python static analysis tools.
Price: Free
Created by Wingware, Wing IDE is a Python-specific software setup that combines the code editing, code navigation, and debugging mechanisms required to Code and Test Software applications. It offers various features such as an intelligent auto-completing Editor, Refactoring, Multi-Selection, and Code Snippets, which make coding much easier and more efficient.
Price: Annual licenses starting at $179/month
18. Smol Developer
Smol is an open-source artificial intelligence agent designed to function as a personal junior developer, capable of generating an entire codebase from your specific product specifications. Unlike traditional, rigid starter templates, Smol can create any kind of application based on your unique requirements. Boasting a codebase that is simple, safe, and small, it offers the perfect blend of ease-of-understanding, customization, and a helpful, harmless, and honest approach to AI development.
Price: Smol is open-source with a MIT License.
Cody (not to be confused with AskCodi), Sourcegraph's AI tool, is a comprehensive coding assistant. It understands your entire codebase, answers queries, and writes code. Beyond guidance, Cody provides detailed code explanations, locates specific components, and identifies potential issues with suggested fixes. Cody works directly in VS code with an extension.
Price: Cody is free for personal use, Sourcegraph starts at $5k/year
CodeWhisperer is a tool developed by Amazon. It offers real-time, AI-driven code suggestions and identifies potential open-source code matches for easier review. It even scans for security vulnerabilities, suggesting immediate patches. An added bonus is its commitment to code safety, always aligning with best security practices such as OWASP guidelines.
Price: Free for personal use, $19/month professional use
21. Bard (Google)
Bard can help with programming and software development tasks, including code generation, debugging and code explanation. These capabilities are supported in more than 20 programming languages including C++, Go, Java, Javascript, Python and Typescript. And you can easily export Python code to Google Colab — no copy and paste required. Bard can also assist with writing functions for Google Sheets.
Price: Google Bard is Free
Code Llama is a set of large language models specialized for coding, built on the Llama 2 platform. It includes different models for various needs: the general-purpose Code Llama, Code Llama - Python for Python-specific tasks, and Code Llama - Instruct for instruction-based coding. These models vary in size (7B, 13B, and 34B parameters) and can handle up to 16k token inputs, with some improvements on up to 100k tokens. The 7B and 13B models also offer content-based infilling.
Code Llama’s training recipes are available on their Github repository - Model weights are also available.
Claude 2 is the latest natural language AI model introduced by Anthropic, a firm established by Dario Amodei, formerly of OpenAI. This new iteration is engineered for enhanced input and output lengths and boasts superior performance relative to its earlier version. Users can input up to 100K tokens in each prompt, which means that Claude can work over hundreds of pages of technical documentation. Claude 2 scored a 71.2% up from 56.0% on the Codex HumanEval, a Python coding test.
A Stability AI Membership is required for commerical application
Update: Claude 3 was recently released with promising updates
Stability AI's Stable Code 3B, a new 3 billion parameter Large Language Model specialized in code completion, which is 60% smaller yet performs similarly to the larger CodeLLaMA 7b. This model, trained on diverse programming languages and software engineering-specific data, can run in real-time on modern laptops without a GPU. Stable Code 3B is part of Stability AI's Membership program and offers advanced features like Fill in the Middle capabilities and expanded context size, demonstrating state-of-the-art performance in multi-language coding tasks.
A Stability AI Membership (Starting at $20/mo) is required for commercial applications. Free for non-commercial.
Replit AI is an innovative code completion tool designed to streamline your coding experience by offering tailored suggestions that align with the context of your current file. As you delve into coding, the tool intuitively presents inline suggestions, enhancing your efficiency and accuracy. Additionally, Replit AI offers advanced features such as the ability to refine suggestions through code comments, the application of prompt engineering for more relevant results, and the flexibility to toggle the code completion feature on or off within the editor settings, ensuring a customized coding environment tailored to your preferences.
Replit AI is available in Replit's Free tier (Limited) and in their Core tier (Advanced Model).
Plandex employs persistent agents that tackle extensive tasks spanning numerous files and involving multiple steps. It segments sizable tasks into manageable subtasks, executing each in sequence until the entire task is accomplished. This tool aids in clearing your backlog, navigating new technologies, overcoming obstacles, and reducing the time spent on mundane activities.
Plandex is open-source on Github
Meta has launched Meta AI, powered by the Llama 3 model with 70 billion parameters. The model positions itself as a powerful asset for improving application functionalities, but it does not match the customization and transparency of more advanced models like GPT-4 Turbo and Claude Opus. The benefits of Meta's approach to open-source AI are multifaceted, including attracting top talent, leveraging community contributions, fostering standardization and lower costs, building goodwill, and aligning with business models that do not rely solely on AI products. While it is described as "open weight," providing access to the model's weights, it does not include the full toolkit necessary for reproduction. They also co-developed Llama 3 with torchtune, the new PyTorch-native library for easily authoring, fine-tuning, and experimenting with LLMs.
Moreover, Meta is also currently pretraining a 405B parameter model, signaling an ambitious expansion of its AI capabilities. This larger model, set to be released later, promises even more powerful functionalities and potential industry leadership if it surpasses current leaders like GPT-4 and Claude Opus. Such a development could reshape industry standards and perceptions, especially against competitors who guard their models under the guise of safety concerns. This bold move by Meta not only showcases their commitment to advancing AI technology but also challenges the industry's more cautious narratives around the sharing and utilization of AI models, setting new benchmarks for what’s achievable in AI development.
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Not to be confused with Meta AI, MetaGPT is a tool that automates the generation of software development outputs such as user stories, competitive analysis, requirements, data structures, APIs, and documents from a single line of input. It integrates roles typically found in a software company—product managers, architects, project managers, and engineers—into its workflow. These roles are executed by large language models (LLMs) following detailed Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs). The core philosophy behind MetaGPT is "Code = SOP(Team)," emphasizing the application of SOPs to organize and direct the work of its LLM teams. This structure aims to mimic the entire process of a software company, simplifying and automating complex tasks.
MetaGPT is MIT licensed and open-source
Over to you!
There you have it! Now you know what AI code tools can help you work more efficiently by simplifying your development process.
However, while AI coding tools can help developers work smarter, you first have to find the right developers for your team. That’s what we do at CodeSubmit – we offer industry-leading skills assessment tests.
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