Using Ollama with Continue: A Developer's Guide

This comprehensive guide will walk you through setting up Ollama with Continue for powerful local AI development. Ollama allows you to run large language models locally on your machine, providing privacy, control, and offline capabilities for AI-assisted coding.

Prerequisites

Before getting started, ensure your system meets these requirements:

• Operating System: macOS, Linux, or Windows
• RAM: Minimum 8GB (16GB+ recommended)
• Storage: At least 10GB free space
• Continue extension installed

Installation Steps

Step 1: Install Ollama

Choose the installation method for your operating system:

# macOSbrew install ollama# Linuxcurl -fsSL https://ollama.ai/install.sh | sh# Windows# Download from ollama.ai

Step 2: Download Models

After installing Ollama, download the models you want to use. Here are some popular options:

# Popular models for developmentollama pull llama2ollama pull codellamaollama pull mistral

Configuration

Configure Continue to work with your local Ollama instance:

Continue Configuration

{
  "models": [
    {
      "title": "Ollama",
      "provider": "ollama",
      "model": "llama2",
      "apiBase": "http://localhost:11434"
    }
  ]
}

Advanced Settings

For optimal performance, consider these advanced configuration options:

• Memory optimization
• GPU acceleration
• Custom model parameters
• Performance tuning

Best Practices

Model Selection

Choose models based on your specific needs:

1. Code Generation: Use CodeLlama or Mistral
2. Chat: Llama2 or Mistral
3. Specialized Tasks: Domain-specific models

Performance Optimization

To get the best performance from Ollama:

• Monitor system resources
• Adjust context window size
• Use appropriate model sizes
• Enable GPU acceleration when available

Troubleshooting

Common Issues

Here are solutions to common problems you might encounter:

Connection Problems

• Check Ollama service status
• Verify port availability
• Review firewall settings

Performance Issues

• Insufficient RAM
• Model too large for system
• GPU compatibility

Solutions

Try these solutions in order:

1. Restart Ollama service
2. Clear model cache
3. Update to latest version
4. Check system requirements

Example Workflows

Code Generation

# Example: Generate a FastAPI endpointdef create_user_endpoint():    # Continue will help generate the implementation    pass

Code Review

Use Continue with Ollama to:

• Analyze code quality
• Suggest improvements
• Identify potential bugs
• Generate documentation

Conclusion

Ollama with Continue provides a powerful local development environment for AI-assisted coding. You now have complete control over your AI models, ensuring privacy and enabling offline development workflows.

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This guide is based on Ollama v0.1.x and Continue v0.8.x. Please check for updates regularly.