How I Use Windsurf for Fast Prototyping and Codex for Multi-file Cleanup

At first AI coding felt magical.

Then my repo hit 40+ files.

Windsurf was still useful for:

• rough structure
• brainstorming
• fast UI iteration

But Codex became much stronger when:

• files started connecting together
• refactoring affected multiple modules
• cleanup became more important than prototyping

My workflow now is usually:

Windsurf -> rough prototype
Codex -> repo-wide cleanup/refactor
Manual testing -> rollback if needed

The larger the repo became, the more context management mattered.