Future

8 Alternatives to AI for Coding and Creativity

Ingo Steinke, web developer on July 02, 2025

AI isn't the solution to all your problems. AI Alternatives are plenty and specific to your use case. Understanding the nature of your query is the...
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leob • Edited

Yeah the way I see it is: the alternative to AI is to keep doing what we were already doing before AI !

And that includes Google ("classical" search), Stack Overflow, etc - yes, that "reviled" Stack Overflow, which you argued we should find 'alternatives' for, might actually be our best friend and one of our "secret weapons" to fight the onslaught of "AI domination" ... ? Think about that for a moment :)

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Oscar

I'm glad you wrote this, and I really like & appreciate what you're saying, but it's sad that we have to tell people that they don't have to and shouldn't use AI for everything. I'm hoping that the twitter screenshot you included is either a needle in the haystack or satire, but it's still terrifying to think that there are people out there who simply don't think anymore. Really great article though. I always enjoy reading your posts.

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david duymelinck

Weird place for the article content, that can only be done by a human.

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Ingo Steinke, web developer

haha, yes, a human who hates when articles start with a page full of TOC links instead of the first paragraphs. I think that blog posts should jump right into the content, more like a short story, not a large book you might find in a university library.

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david duymelinck

I was curious and I found that you can add the details and summary tags.

{% details summary %} content {% enddetails %}
  {% spoiler summary %} content {% endspoiler %}
  {% collapsible summary %} content {% endcollapsible %}
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

The fix for your TOC hate. Which I totally get.

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Ingo Steinke, web developer

Thanks, that will save me typing next time!

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Ingo Steinke, web developer • Edited

Another observation, as common wisdom claims that AI coding assistance works better with new, more explicit and type-safe front-end code like Astro, React, Vite, and TypeScript, the npm-based web development ecosystem still suffers the issue of recurring breaking changes and incompatible peer dependencies, and AI does not handle that much better than human trial-and-error plus watching unresolved GitHub issues did

I'd prefer stable software, good documentation, and relevant search results to AI-assisted guesswork.

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Ingo Steinke, web developer

I have updated the posts and added a paragraph about using dialog techniques and code reviews even when working alone.

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Patrick Harrold

Great article, Ingo. It’s refreshing to see someone highlight the value of human tools and discipline in a time when AI is everywhere.

That said, for devs who do want to use AI but need tighter control over data privacy and hallucination prevention, I’d suggest checking out TeraVera. I work there, and we built a secure AI platform with strict tenant-level data isolation. It’s designed for people who want the benefits of AI without the risks of data leakage or model overreach.

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Masud Al Imran

I was expecting some out of the world alternatives. But it seems you just listed the ways we used to do it before AI.

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Dan Edens • Edited

right... This isn't really an article