We are probably all familiar with GitHub's Copilot feature, an AI pair programmer which uses the OpenAI Codex to suggest code based on comments you make about it. However, it is currently only available as a VS Code extension and costs $10 per month. When searching for alternatives, I stumbled upon the Code Complete app. A feature of YouCode, a search engine for developers by You.com.
Like Copilot, with Code Complete, you can just input a comment on what you need and which language the code should be written in. Code Complete then outputs the code and lets you directly copy and paste it into whatever coding environment you are using. If you don't like the result, you can simply generate a new snippet by clicking the ‘generate code‘ button again. And unlike Copilot, you can do all of that right from your browser without the need to install an extra extension.
But how well does it actually work? From experience, really good. For most snippets, Code Complete provided great results and the code I searched for. I tested it out with some queries, found code for searching tweets containing a certain phrase, found the minimum value of a dictionary, and generated the fibonacci sequence in a couple of minutes. Writing all the code myself or searching for it on the internet would have taken way longer.
However, what I noticed is that sometimes I was provided with more code than I searched for. For example, when asking how to find the maximum value of a dictionary, Code Complete gave me both the minimum and maximum values.
I've also been impressed with Code Complete's ability to generate code from lesser-known libraries. When asking how to generate a sphere in vpython, a python library released back in 2000 to generate 3D graphics, Code Complete provided me (after a couple of generations) with the code I wanted.
Conclusion
It is incredible seeing what AI is already capable of today and just cool watching real-time code generated from comments. Code Complete is free, so I highly recommend giving it a shot! And make sure to comment on what you think!