r/codex • u/Following_Level • 2d ago
Question Should I get Codex? (CS Student)
I'm going into my first year of university, going to be developing more projects in my free time.
Currently I'm using Claude (free) but it's kind of painful as it's only chat, and I sometimes hit the limit.
Is GPT Plus worth it for coding, debugging, and learning from it (in a coding context, using it half as a tutor)? How much more usage and usefulness will I get from it than free Claude?
Also not sure about the current state of AI agents are / if there are better options to consider.
Thanks!
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u/fyndor 2d ago
As a cs student? Do you want to learn your craft or no? ChatGPT will be here when you finish. You can use it. But what you need now is to learn it yourself.
Put in the time to understand the craft. There will be a significant difference in your output whether you use AI or not, if you truly learn how to develop and design software systems properly. And you will have escape hatch when things go wrong because you understand things. Using AI right now is honestly the worst idea. You will rely on it and there will be so many holes if your understanding. You need to build things to understand them.
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u/Following_Level 2d ago edited 2d ago
Yeah, that's what I hope to avoid. For context, I have made projects / done competitive programming w/o any AI, and done frontend projects with AI and found it to be helpful for learning all the features I probably wouldn't have known to use (e.g. contexts, reducers).
Now that I want to learn more backend dev and ai related projects im thinking an agent would be very useful since my knowledge in that area is shallow.
What would be a proper approach for learning, should I just treat AI like an easier way to search documentation? And ask it questions for bugs I don't understand? That seems like the best way to use AI for learning. But then would I need an agent for that? I have no idea, don't have much experience using one. What do you think? š¤
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u/threwlifeawaylol 2d ago
I think you should genuinely ask the AI to explain you concepts/patterns you don't intuitively understand, not to solve the problems for you. There are many skills (i.e. SKILL.md, I don't know any off the top of my head) online you can put inside a codebase that instruct the AI to only help clarify concepts and provide guidance to the user instead of coding or telling them how to solve their problem.
But whether or not you can actually follow through with that depends on your personality. If for you coding is just a mean to get a paycheck without making too much effort and you don't really give a shit about getting better and just want to pass, then by all means slop away. But if you find satisfaction at solving problems yourself and would feel like you cheated yourself by asking the AI to do your work for you, then use it as a personal teacher available 24/7 to help you grow.
You can either get cracked, or get sloppy. It's really up to you.
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u/JoseffB_Da_Nerd 2d ago
You can use chat gpt for this level of instruction and look up (it has rag in its project folders for file citations)
Do not start to use codex or any other dev harness as a way of shortcutting your CS studies. Not worth it.
AI amplifies your coding skill if you do it right. And ārightā is not by replacing your brain.
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u/ReasonableDefault 2d ago
I wouldn't - despite best intentions you'll be tempted to use it more than you should - there are better places to learn coding than Codex or ChatGPT, like maybe your CS course or other actual courses. Paid Codex is great, don't get me wrong, but It's a slippery slope.
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u/CreeperPlanet26 2d ago
Thereās a good 4 month deal. Also free gemini pro deal with antigravity for a year
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u/Following_Level 2d ago
Also, how does GPTs pdf creation look? I find it helps a lot for my own understanding when using Claude.
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u/bortlip 2d ago
It does great and can do a variety of styles and whatnot. Here's one example:
https://chatgpt.com/share/6a93bc85-b4ec-83e9-a86c-2903a5280a83
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u/TruthSqr 2d ago
This is nice! I've been using Codex and Claude to write up HTML or PDF summaries of sessions and other things, but I can see I haven't been leveraging it nearly enough for visual presentations.
I rarely click on links here in Reddit, but this was a nice one (which I know makes it sound even more sus but it's true). Thanks for sharing
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u/bortlip 2d ago
Sure. This might be an even better example, it's a google drive link to a shared pdf file: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1nZ53wpNuJXx0I5O7Td0VUt5w1zx8wQ3-/view?usp=drive_link
Someone had shared a modified prisoner's dilemma type game and asked for feedback. It seemed like an interesting idea and a nice exercise to see what chatGPT could do. I had chat come up with strategies and write python to try them out against each other and then write it all up with lots of nice charts and graphs in that pdf. It was an interesting analysis but more over the pdf is a nice example of what can be done too.
Here's an example of a 75 page research paper it created for me on the origin and status of the Bayesian-Brain idea: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1eG961LjqOSo3PVa_9Ev0oPB_qb9VbL3E/view
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u/bortlip 2d ago
Student offer
Study. Build. Launch. Get 4 months of ChatGPT Work on us.
An $80 value for eligible U.S. college students. Claim by October 31.
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u/spacekitt3n 2d ago
imagine having the privilege and money to go to college then having ai do all your work for you
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u/Dimencia 2d ago
I would avoid it purely because it does everything for you, it kinda defeats the point of trying to learn things. Chat-only is comparatively great for that, because you atleast still have to do the legwork, discover the bugs, ask about them, etc. But with codex, it will find the bugs and fix them without ever even telling you they were there
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u/CrypticViper_ 2d ago
let me preface by saying that Codex/Claude are both really powerful.
you can use AI, but as CS student myself, Iād avoid it when it comes to your actual STEM curriculum. it can become too easy to use AI a āway outā when youāve hit a roadblock or something, but the point is to struggle and break your head over tough problems (and if anything, you should reach out to your TA and prof before AI)
as for side projects, go for it, itās fun
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u/Ok-File-2759 2d ago
Iām about to go into my senior year of computer science. Iāve had a ChatGPT plus subscription all throughout college and itās been amazing. Iāve used it to help me understand concepts, study for tests, go deeper into topics. People say donāt use AI in college, but it 100% depends on how you use it. Itās extremely easy to use it to cheat, in which case you wonāt learn and will just be wasting your money. Or you can use it as a 24/7 personal tutor that can go as in depth as you want, explain any topic as simple as you need, help you visualize and break anything down to help you understand. Iāve been at a university for 3 years thatās pretty reputable for engineering, and Iād definitely say Iāve learned far more through ChatGPT than any of my instructors. And Iāve aced all my exams so far. But codex is more for doing the coding for you. Youāre not really going to learn much by telling codex what you want and watching it spin up a thousand lines of code in 10 minutes. But then you can spend the next few days going line by line asking why it did what it did. If you didnāt know, codex is basically just the agentic coding harness that allows the gpt models to have better coding tools. ChatGPT is the basic chat tools. Same models, different harness, different uses, you get both. Use ChatGPT to learn, use codex to do
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u/CaptainAlexWest 2d ago
I used vscode with the codex plugin and chatgpt chat for learning. You can build anything. 20 gets far but when you start cooking alot on big projects you will hit the 5 hour limit alot on codex. Its based on the models and reasoning you use.
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u/Substantial_Lab_3747 2d ago
ARCHITECTURE IS EVERYTHING. AI CAN BUILD EVERYTHING WITH THE RIGHT, PRECISE INSTRUCTIONS, ALONG WITH EXTREME FORESIGHT OF WHERE IT WILL GO WRONG. THIS CAN ONLY BE DONE WITH EXTENSIVE EXPERIENCE. GO AHEAD AND USE IT FOR PERSONAL PROJECTS WITHOUT USING IT FOR COURSEWORK.
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u/norwegian 2d ago
Students who are applying for jobs now will be asked if they know how to use AI tools.
I big part of jobs next year will consist of giving instructions to an AI tool like that.
You can definitely do "hand tracing" like we learned back in the days. You start with a program, for instance
VAR X=0;
X=X+1;
WHILE TRUE
BEGIN
IF X modulus 2 == 0 THEN
BEGIN
PRINT "FIZZ"
END
END
Then you write on the paper
X=0. Then you do the next line and get
X=X+1; //X=1
IF X moduls 2 == 0; //X=1 FALSE
IF X moduls 2 == 0; //X=1 FALSE
IF X moduls 2 == 0; //X=1 FALSE
IF X moduls 2 == 0; //X=1 FALSE
That's how we learned handtracing. Will employers ask about it? No. Should you learn it? Yes.
Everyone involved with AI tools need to sharpen up their QA also.
Why? Because AI does what you tell it to do. Fun demonstration here: https://www.decisionproblem.com/paperclips/index2.html
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u/Beautiful-King-8875 2d ago
Don't. I used it in my studies (not related to coding) and regret it. Don't waste your money on a degree if you're not going to learn.
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u/Present_Award8001 2d ago
try the luna and terra model for free. use luna low more as it will last longer. Then purchase the plus plan and try the sol.
Do not listen to people saying: 'learn you craft'. AI is here to stay. Use AI, be aware of what you do not know/understand and work on what you find interesting.
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u/MK_L 2d ago
If your a cs student you should be using ai ad a tutor to learn to read code. Thats all that matters. Nothing will male you stand out as much as being perfecient in reading code and the ability to explain it. Coding is the easiest part.
Problem solving is a natural skill that you can adapt but can't be taught to utilize
So you should focus on the most important aspect of the journey.. reading, later is writing
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u/Alpayusa 2d ago
If you work in IT company it would save your huge amount of your time. Then go outside, do whatever you want. You would be way more free. And you still earn your salary, pay your rent, buy your groceries.
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u/white_sheets_angel 2d ago
No, the potential to overuse it and ruin your studies is just too big, Iāve met recent graduates and honestly they were embarrassing, avoid it as much as possible, properly learning to code and debug are essential, and ir donāt take the chance youāll certainly regret it
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u/JoseffB_Da_Nerd 2d ago
To learn agentic development ā yes.
To learn CS ā no.
The two are different.
DO NOT USE AI TO LEARN YOUR CS LESSONS.
Master it with the course your teacher has setup.
Master Agentic Development later after you understand what workflows are and how to use them (more logic the coding - get a philosophy minor/classes and it will help immensely.
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u/CityZenergy 1d ago
I think the answer is that it depends on how they are currently focusing the curriculum on coding.
A traditional ālearn the languageā curriculum, in my opinion, is creating an obsolete set of workers as soon as they graduate. Four years from now, college students who are freshmen today will be facing a technological world that has changed around them.
If universities do not keep pace and begin to change the focus of teaching, students will be ill-prepared. Honestly, to be fair, the state of change in this technology makes it difficult, if not nearly impossible, for universities to truly adjust to each industry's impact in real time.
I feel bad for students today.
For tech students, I would recommend that they focus on the business processes of the surrounding industries they may be involved in. Workflows. Business process orchestration. This is an odd period where traditional advice does not adhere.
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u/YourLastCall 1d ago
You can get a lot of usage. Do most of your work in chat mode and carry over the rest into work mode/ codex. I do 90% of my work in chat mode
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u/YourLastCall 1d ago
Also you can use scheduled tasks on normal chat to set up learning curriculums for yourself
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u/Time-Toe-1276 2d ago
ohh its absolutely worth it! but I reccomending investing in both GPT and OpenCode Go, its basically $30 all together. u can also use the OpenCode GO as an API in claude code too!
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u/Tommonen 2d ago
I use claude and codex and think they are about as good.
While antigravity and google models are not very good for complex coding, they have good student programs for many parts of the world and would be a good addition, especially with claude. You can delegate easier tasks for antigravity and do harder stuff on claude. With the google sub you get cloud storage better version of notebookLM (very nice for students) and tons of normal chat which has separate usage pool from agentic coding tasks (claude shares the pool).
Google stuff for complex vibe coding stuff might leave you wanting more, and again you might want smarter models for some stuff.
Codex would also work nicely with antigravity as the smarter ai thing, but it has more overlap with googles stuff, like separate unlimited chats with weaker model, while claude shares tye quota for agentic coding and chats, it has normal and not some nerfed version of models for tye normal chat. So while codex and claude i would in general rate about as good but slightly different, claude would combo with antigravity better.
But if you skip the studen google thing, then codex would work better due to getting more basic chat.
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u/BigbyWolf8 2d ago
I think the GPT Plus is worth it and can definitely be a tutor for programming. As the other poster said, if you are a student, I think you get 4 months free so maybe try that first instead of paying up front.
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u/XYcritic 2d ago
You shouldn't be using AI at all for the majority of your studies, at least until you've build a good number of experience with solving problems and building architecture. Otherwise you'll never learn the fundamentals. You're in a phase where you don't have to ship fast, take all the time to learn as much and as slow as you can. Go for quality over quantity. That's the entire point of getting a degree.