So my sister was experimenting with some of the online AI coding things like replit but she has never done any kind of coding, knows nothing about programming etc.. but was having fun. So I made this installer that just gets a windows computer set up with vs code, tools, ai stuff. So you can jump right into coding and not pay anything.
If anyone has anything to add to this, or any feedback i’m happy to hear it. I could maybe create some better docs or guides, like a simple example project that takes you through the steps to make something simple and cool, using the free AI usage available. I’ll improve it if anyone actually uses it other than myself. It was more time consuming than I expected, just to get the thing to work.
Full transparency one of the tools is something I made (aicodeprep-gui) but it is free and basically just like similar tools like repomix but it opens up a UI to select the files/has some preset buttons and stuff like that. Some people like their UIs (I made it for myself) and it can be less “intimidating” to non programmers (well… maybe that is a myth). There is no gotcha or weird hidden crap in it that I have come to expect in 2025 like “Here’s a pile of free stuff until the moment you’re habituated and tired. Then, armed with data and behavioral science, it’ll strike at your weakest point and charge you 500x what it should be, if you don’t pay, you will have wasted months”
If anyone other than me actually uses it I could improve it and do it better but I would only add things that don’t do any of the shady stuff, “marketing trickery” etc. VS Code is free, Cline extension free, and if those free Qwen3/Gemini runs out someday, you just plug in another cheap API provider or whatever the new free thing is, so what you learned won’t be a waste.