AI-Assisted Development

PrestaShop provides built-in context files that help AI coding assistants understand the project’s architecture, conventions, and domain rules. These files are committed directly in the repositories and require no manual configuration.

The full .ai/ context structure in the core repository is available starting from PrestaShop 9.2. The ps_apiresources and hummingbird repositories already include their own context files.

Why built-in AI context?

PrestaShop is a large, mature codebase with strict architectural rules, legacy boundaries, and domain-specific patterns that AI tools cannot infer on their own. Without explicit guidance, AI assistants tend to:

  • Generate code using deprecated ObjectModel patterns instead of CQRS
  • Ignore multistore constraints
  • Mix architectural layers (e.g., calling the database from a controller)
  • Miss project-specific naming conventions

The AI context files solve this by providing a single source of truth that all AI tools can consume.

Agnostic by design

Rather than maintaining separate configuration for each AI tool, PrestaShop uses a centralized approach:

  1. CONTEXT.md files contain all the actual guidance (architecture rules, coding standards, do/don’t lists, domain knowledge). They are written in plain Markdown, readable by both humans and AI.

  2. Pointer files at the repository root redirect each tool to the central context:

File Tool
CLAUDE.md Claude Code
AGENTS.md Generic AI agents
.cursor/rules/prestashop-context.mdc Cursor
.github/copilot-instructions.md GitHub Copilot
.windsurfrules Windsurf
GEMINI.md Gemini CLI

This means context is maintained in one place and all tools automatically stay up to date.

Supported repositories

Repository Context structure Since
PrestaShop/PrestaShop Full .ai/ hierarchy with domain and component contexts 9.2
PrestaShop/ps_apiresources Single CONTEXT.md at root with pointer files Available now
PrestaShop/hummingbird Single CONTEXT.md at root with pointer files Available now

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Next: Context Structure ›