Author(s): Gergely Szerovay

Originally published on Towards AI.

A cost-efficient and secure coding process using Claude Desktop & Dev containersImage by the author.

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In this article, I will talk about something that’s been a game-changer for my development workflow — combining VS Code Dev Containers with Claude AI. This setup lets your AI assistant to access and interact with your project files directly.

By using the Model Context Protocol (MCP), we create a connection that keeps Claude’s access limited to just the files in your container, maintaining that important isolation and security we all want.

One thing I love about this approach is the full control it gives you over code generation. While there are many excellent dev tools available, many of them operate as black boxes with considerable functionality happening under the hood. With our MCP and Dev Container combination, your main IDE remains VS Code, but you gain the flexibility to use any chat client that supports MCP. Since these tools aren’t VS Code plugins, they’re typically easier to understand, tweak to your liking.

Here’s another compelling advantage: there are no API costs associated… Read the full blog for free on Medium.

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Published via Towards AI