The tooling can be hacky and of questionable quality yet, with such a model, things can still work out pretty well.
The moat is their training and fine-tuning for common programming languages.
It's a bit of both. Claude Code was the tool that made Anthropic's developer mindshare explode. Yes, the models are good, but before CC they were mostly just available via multiplexers like Cursor and Copilot, via the relatively expensive API.
And at first glance, none of it was about complex runtime optimizations not present in Node, it was all "standard" closure-related JS/TS memory leak debugging (which can be a nightmare).
I don't have a link at hand because threads about it were mostly on Xitter. But I'm sure there are also more accessible retros about the posts on regular websites (HN threads, too).
if you have one of the top models in a disruptive new product category where everyone else is sprinting also, sure..
Code quality only matters in maintainability to developers. IMO it's a very subjective metric
Code quality = less bugs long term.
Code quality = faster iteration and easier maintenance.
If things are bad enough it becomes borderline impossible to add features.
Users absolutely care about these things.
How do you measure code quality?
> Users absolutely care about these things.
No, users care about you adding new features, not in your ability to add new features or how much it cost you to add features.
After some experience, it feels to me (currently primarily a JS/TS developer) like most SPAs are ridden by memory leaks and insane memory usage. And, while it doesn't run in the browser, the same think seems to apply to Claude CLI.
Lexical closures used in long-living abstractions, especially when leveraging reactivity and similar ideas, seems to be a recipe for memory-devouring apps, regardless of browser rendering being involved or not.
The problems metastasize because most apps never run into scenarios where it matters, a page reload or exit always is close enough on the horizon to deprioritize memory usage issues.
But as soon as there are large allocations, such as the strings involved in LLM agent orchestration, or in non-trivial other scenarios, the "just ship it" approac requires careful revision.
Refactoring shit that used to "just work" with memory leaks is not always easy, no matter whose shit it is.
You don’t have to go far on this site to find someone that doesn’t like Claude code.
If you want an example of something moronic, look at the ram usage of Claude code. It can use gigabytes of memory to work with a few megabytes of text.
In the current market, most people using one LLM are likely going to have a positive view of it. Very little is forcing you to stick with one you dislike aside from corporate mandates.
To be fair, their complaints are about very recent changes that break their workflow, while previously they were quite content with it.
Anthropic et al. better figure it out sooner rather than later because this game they’re all playing where they want all of us to use basically beta-release tools (very generous in some cases) to discover the “real value” of these tools while they attempt to reduce their burn with unsustainable subscription prices can’t go on forever.