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Sigh, why has the industry converged on TUI? Branding and aesthetics over functionality? TUI is just much worse for me. I tried Codex CLI vs Codex UI and Codex

Sigh, why has the industry converged on TUI? Branding and aesthetics over functionality? TUI is just much worse for me. I tried Codex CLI vs Codex UI and Codex UI beats it at every level.

maipen 3mo ago
And why are you assuming the industry converged to it when your following statement dismantles your assumption? Spacex bought cursor, so it now has it’s agent ui which is just as good as codex + it’s multi-modal Anthropic also has it’s own ui Zai also launched theirs last month. Everyone is converging back to UI. The terminal was just a prototype, everyone knew that.
- simianwords 3mo ago
  Claude code which is most used agent harness doesn’t have desktop equivalent
  - pproe 3mo ago
    Apart from Claude desktop, that is...
  - saratogacx 3mo ago
    It has had one for months. The desktop app has a "code" mode which is Claude Code in GUI form
  - yoyohello13 3mo ago
    https://code.claude.com/docs/en/desktop https://code.claude.com/docs/en/desktop
- greggh 3mo ago
  Just a prototype? I have no reason to leave the terminal for a GUI IDE. TUI works great, does what I need and is very easy to use and interact with.
  - dolmen 3mo ago
    TUI is not so great for copying a multiline block of text displayed on the terminal when it is indented or shown in a boxed widget. I'm not saying that GUI are always better at allowing copying: this still requires the developer to design widgets that allow copying.
lynndotpy 3mo ago
TUI is a lot better for me, and I have preferred it since the 00s, before LLM products were even a thing. For all the reasons there can be, one big reason is that it works on anything you can get a terminal on, you can use it over SSH, and the UI will be the same no matter where you use it. I also like that they are very very fast and they don't have the incessant animations that are put into most desktop environments nowadays. If you're on MacOS, the terminal is the only only part of your computer without roadblocks everywhere.
_pdp_ 3mo ago
It is a fashion thing. I am not saying that agentic TUIs are bad or anything but it is certain fashionable to use one in 2026.
- fouc 3mo ago
  Terminal is where the real work has always been done. VS Code on the other hand is 100% a fashion thing.
christophilus 3mo ago
I run it in containers. TUI is much easier to containerize vs GUI.
thomasjb 3mo ago
Easiest to use when sshing into a VM.
bakies 3mo ago
no way man, the only thing I do outside a terminal is slack and web browsing.

Sigh, why has the industry converged on TUI? Branding and aesthetics over functionality? TUI is just much worse for me. I tried Codex CLI vs Codex UI and Codex UI beats it at every level.

maipen 3mo ago

And why are you assuming the industry converged to it when your following statement dismantles your assumption? Spacex bought cursor, so it now has it’s agent ui which is just as good as codex + it’s multi-modal Anthropic also has it’s own ui Zai also launched theirs last month. Everyone is converging back to UI. The terminal was just a prototype, everyone knew that.

simianwords 3mo ago
Claude code which is most used agent harness doesn’t have desktop equivalent
- pproe 3mo ago
  Apart from Claude desktop, that is...
- saratogacx 3mo ago
  It has had one for months. The desktop app has a "code" mode which is Claude Code in GUI form
- yoyohello13 3mo ago
  https://code.claude.com/docs/en/desktop https://code.claude.com/docs/en/desktop
greggh 3mo ago
Just a prototype? I have no reason to leave the terminal for a GUI IDE. TUI works great, does what I need and is very easy to use and interact with.
- dolmen 3mo ago
  TUI is not so great for copying a multiline block of text displayed on the terminal when it is indented or shown in a boxed widget. I'm not saying that GUI are always better at allowing copying: this still requires the developer to design widgets that allow copying.

lynndotpy 3mo ago

TUI is a lot better for me, and I have preferred it since the 00s, before LLM products were even a thing. For all the reasons there can be, one big reason is that it works on anything you can get a terminal on, you can use it over SSH, and the UI will be the same no matter where you use it. I also like that they are very very fast and they don't have the incessant animations that are put into most desktop environments nowadays. If you're on MacOS, the terminal is the only only part of your computer without roadblocks everywhere.

_pdp_ 3mo ago

It is a fashion thing. I am not saying that agentic TUIs are bad or anything but it is certain fashionable to use one in 2026.

fouc 3mo ago
Terminal is where the real work has always been done. VS Code on the other hand is 100% a fashion thing.

christophilus 3mo ago

I run it in containers. TUI is much easier to containerize vs GUI.

thomasjb 3mo ago

Easiest to use when sshing into a VM.

bakies 3mo ago

no way man, the only thing I do outside a terminal is slack and web browsing.