Point Cursor at a repo you have never seen and actually understand it
New codebase, no docs. Cursor's chat-with-files mode turns a scary folder into a guided tour.
Inherited a repo with no README and a deadline. Cursor's ability to read the project let me skip the usual week of grep-and-guess.
I opened the chat and asked plain questions: 'Where does auth happen? What calls the payment endpoint? Why is this module named twice?' Each answer pointed at a file with a quote, so I could verify instead of trust.
Then I asked for a one-page architecture summary in my own words back to it, to confirm I understood. When it corrected me, that was the gap closed before I touched code.
The limit: Cursor explains what is there, not what was intended. For the 'why,' I still pinged the original author. The tool maps the territory; it does not replace the historian.