AI coding · Tools

Codebase Indexing

Also called: Project index, Code index, Indexed codebase

The AI editor scans and indexes your project ahead of time so chat and completions can find relevant code without rereading everything each turn.

In detail

Codebase indexing is like building a searchable catalog of the repo. The tool reads files in the background (often with embeddings) so that "where is order status updated?" can jump to the right files first.

An index is not a perfect live mirror. A fresh large branch, lots of generated files, or ignore rules can hide code from the AI. Watch privacy and size: secrets and huge build artifacts should stay out.

Versus a Context Window: indexing decides what can be found; the window decides how much fits in this turn. If a file can't be found, better prompting won't help.

Developer infoTerm ID, DOM cues, match priority

Term ID: ai-codebase-indexing
DOM selectors: No DOM cues. This concept isn't detected directly on a page.
Priority: 1 · when several match at the same level, the higher priority wins
Version: v1 · updated Oct 5, 2026