Cursor Tutorial: Set Up a Project and Verify Your First Change

A useful first Cursor task ends with a small diff you can explain and a check you can run. This tutorial uses an existing project rather than a personal story about abandoning another editor. It does not rank available models or quote a fixed subscription price.

Open the real project

Get the application from the official Cursor site and follow its current setup instructions. Open the repository root, review workspace trust and account settings, and establish the build in a terminal before using an agent.

Record the language runtime and wrapper version. If the application does not build before the task, keep that failure as the baseline. An editor’s syntax diagnostics are not a substitute for the repository build.

Choose a task with an observable result

For a Java project, a reasonable first task is to add a null-input check to one utility with a defined exception policy. Avoid starting with “modernize the codebase”: that leaves scope and success undefined.

Give Cursor the relevant method and nearby tests. Ask it to explain the current behavior and propose the smallest change. Check the referenced paths before allowing edits. The same habit works for other languages: establish input, output, and failure behavior before judging the patch.

Use rules for stable conventions

The Rules documentation describes project rule files and activation. Put a few repository-specific facts in .cursor/rules/, such as the wrapper command, generated-code paths, and the requirement to preserve unrelated edits.

Avoid claiming a rule guarantees compliance. If a constraint must be enforced, use the build, permissions, or review process. The rules tutorial includes a scoped example and a way to verify activation.

Inspect the context used

An index helps retrieve code. It does not establish a complete call graph, resolve all active framework configuration, or prove an answer saw every relevant file.

For exact symbols, compare the answer with IDE navigation or repository search. For generated or duplicate code, inspect the paths being retrieved. The codebase-context guide explains this for a multi-module Java project.

Check ignore settings using the ignore-file reference. Index exclusion and process permissions solve different problems. Do not assume a hidden index entry means a terminal command cannot read the file.

Verify the first change

Read the diff and check for unrelated edits, new dependencies, weakened assertions, or accidental changes to public behavior. Run the focused test and then the appropriate project verification task.

For Java, check that the test was discovered rather than relying on a green summary. The JUnit review guide covers meaningful assertions. If the repository uses Spring Boot, the Spring workflow adds authorization, wiring, and persistence checks.

Keep a short result record: task, starting revision, selected model, changed files, commands, and limitations. A blocked check should remain blocked in the report; it should not become a skipped test hidden behind success.

Decide whether the workflow fits

Evaluate a few recurring tasks with the same acceptance criteria and include correction time. Use the plan and model choices currently available in your own account; check the vendor’s pricing and limits before paying. An old table claiming every model has the same price or context is unreliable.

For a comparison method, use the tool-selection worksheet. The right first result is a verified small change, not a claim that the editor replaces every other tool you use.