How to Leverage AI for Smarter ProcessWire Development

[zilli]

Hey guys — maybe you can shed some light here.

I'm an old-school wannabe coder. My setup has been the same for years: Linux, PHP built-in server, and Sublime Text 4. It works flawlessly, and I'd prefer not to change it 🙂. Recently I've been experimenting with AI and I can clearly see how powerful and productive it can be. The thing is, I always use the web UI, regardless of the model. My workflow is usually:

•     Use code2prompt.dev to package my code
•     Upload it to the AI agent
•     Start prompting

This works reasonably well for me, but I often hit usage limits.

From what I've seen, most people using code agents seem to have very different workflows (often involving Node.js tools, which I'm really not into 😞). So I'm curious: did you have to significantly change your development workflow to get good results from AI models? Or is anyone using something closer to a traditional setup like mine?

[wbmnfktr]

The closest to a traditional setup for me would probably be:

1. VS Code (or any fork or the Codium version)
2. plus one of these extensions: Kilo Code, RooCode or Cline
3. Coding Plan from either Z.AI or MiniMax.io

VS Code an be installed almost everywhere without adding Node.js or other packages.
The extensions can be installed from within VS Code but as they are quite similar, you should probably test them all.
I kept Kilo Code as it felt to be the most stable and reliable one.

Also Kilo Code offers additional features but only when using their subscription, for daily usage you can bring your own API keys and use those.

[ryan]

@Peter Knight is that a C2 BikeErg?

[Peter Knight]

1 hour ago, ryan said:

@Peter Knight is that a C2 BikeErg?

That's the one. You know it well ?
Unfortunately, the gym here only has 1 of them. It's certainly the only cycling machine I know of that pumps out km and processwire code at the same time. Well, AI agents do at least.

[Peter Knight]

3 hours ago, zilli said:

Hey guys — maybe you can shed some light here.

I'm an old-school wannabe coder. My setup has been the same for years: Linux, PHP built-in server, and Sublime Text 4.

I really like Sublime text. Slightly OT but have you tried Nova by Panic? I really like it and the built in remote server configuration: https://help.nova.app/remote-files/publishing/

 

[Peter Knight]

Hey, if anyone is using Cursor for AI development, I just added some interesting functionality to the MCP module, including full 360 local/remote sync.

 

[Peter Knight]

5 minutes ago, Peter Knight said:

Hey, if anyone is using Cursor for AI development, I just added some interesting functionality to the MCP module, including full 360 local/remote sync.

 

And I created an almost identical blog post about the module using the module, without opening the CMS admin once. That's the demo/use case right there.

[gebeer]

On 3/8/2026 at 11:36 PM, Peter Knight said:

Hey, if anyone is using Cursor for AI development, I just added some interesting functionality to the MCP module, including full 360 local/remote sync.

Awesome! MCP should work with Claude Code, Codex, OPenCode, Pi, Windsurf etc also, no?

[Peter Knight]

26 minutes ago, gebeer said:

Awesome! MCP should work with Claude Code, Codex, OPenCode, Pi, Windsurf etc also, no?

From what I know about MCP, it should, but I only use Cursor, so I can't confirm.

[ai_slop]

@wbmnfktr MiniMax looks interesting. How does it compare to something like Claude? If I'm not mistaken, you or another member on here mentioned Kimi Code on here recently... Curious if there are any useful alternatives to Claude. When I last tried it I hit usage limits rather quickly. 

I'm wondering if there's any easy way of giving AI an awareness of a ProcessWire site's template structure and fields when working with them? Are MCP's capable of that or is it more of a knowledgebase type thing? (noob alert🚨) 

[szabesz]

6 hours ago, ai_slop said:

I'm wondering if there's any easy way of giving AI an awareness of a ProcessWire site's template structure and fields when working with them?

Also see: https://processwire.com/talk/topic/31761-developing-while-biking/#findComment-252011