Configure and run Aider, an AI pair programming tool that edits code in your local git repository. Optimized for OpenAI o4-mini with file watching, shell command suggestions, and conventions-aware coding.
Configure and run Aider, an AI pair programming tool that directly edits code in your local git repository.
This skill sets up Aider with optimized defaults for AI-assisted coding:
When the user wants to use Aider for coding tasks:
1. **Verify Prerequisites**
- Confirm you're in a git repository (Aider requires git)
- Check that the `.aider.conf.yml` configuration file exists or needs to be created
- Verify necessary API keys are available (OpenAI API key required)
2. **Configuration Setup**
- If `.aider.conf.yml` doesn't exist, create it with the following key settings:
- `model: openai/o4-mini`
- `weak-model: openai/o4-mini`
- `auto-commits: false`
- `watch-files: true`
- `suggest-shell-commands: true`
- `chat-language: English`
- `read: [conventions.org]` (if project has coding conventions)
- `editor: emacsclient` (or user's preferred editor)
3. **Launch Aider**
- Start Aider with specific files: `aider file1.py file2.js`
- Or let Aider auto-detect files: `aider`
- Add read-only context files with `--read filename`
4. **Coding Workflow**
- Use natural language to describe code changes
- Aider will propose edits in the configured format
- Review changes before accepting (auto-commits disabled)
- Use `/help` within Aider for available commands
- Use `/add filename` to add more files to the chat
- Use `/commit` to manually commit changes
5. **File Watching Mode**
- With `watch-files: true`, Aider monitors files for special comments
- Add AI coding comments in watched files to trigger automatic processing
- Useful for continuous coding assistance
6. **Advanced Features**
- Use `--message "your request"` for one-off edits without interactive chat
- Enable `--architect` mode for high-level design discussions
- Set `--test-cmd` to automatically run tests after changes
- Configure `--lint-cmd` for language-specific linting
```bash
aider src/app.py tests/test_app.py
aider --message "Add error handling to the login function" src/auth.py
aider --read conventions.org src/new_feature.py
aider --check-update
```
Aider searches for `.aider.conf.yml` in this order:
1. Git repository root
2. Current working directory
3. Home directory
Place the configuration where it makes sense for your workflow (typically git root for project-specific settings).
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