Context management in integrated development environments based on artificial intelligence using the Cursor IDE as an example
Abstract
Context management in integrated development environments based on artificial intelligence using the Cursor IDE as an example
Incoming article date: 01.10.2025The article discusses integrated development environments based on artificial intelligence as an innovative programming tool that provides automation of routine software development tasks. The Cursor development environment, developed by Anywhere, is the main object of research. The architectural features of the system are analyzed, including an agent-based approach to interacting with code, context management mechanisms through generation supplemented with extracted data, and code base indexing using vector representations and Merkle trees to optimize updates. The key limitations of modern integrated development environments based on artificial intelligence have been identified: problems with the size of the context window, indexing performance of large repositories, accuracy of context extraction, as well as privacy and security issues. Special attention is paid to the human factor – the lack of competence of developers in the field of effective context management and the creation of high-quality products. The article substantiates the need to create a preliminary context management agent capable of technically optimizing processes and directing users to effective practices of working with integrated development environments based on artificial intelligence.
Keywords: integrated development environment, artificial intelligence, Cursor development environment, large language models, context management, generation with addition of extracted data, code base indexing, Merkle trees, agent-based approach, software developmen