Iteration Plan for April 2025

[kieferrm]

This plan captures our work in April 2025. This is a 4-week iteration. We will ship in early May.

Since mid-December, GitHub Copilot has been available for free for everyone. This allows us to treat AI support as an out-of-the-box experience in VS Code. Consequently, going forward, we'll cover our client-side work for Copilot in this plan, similarly to how we have been tracking our work on our Remote Extensions over the last years.

Endgame

• April 28, 2025: Endgame begins
• May 02, 2025: Endgame done

The endgame details for this iteration are tracked here.

Plan Items

Below is a summary of the top level plan items.

Legend of annotations:

Mark	Description
🏃	work in progress
✋	blocked task
💪	stretch goal for this iteration
🔴	missing issue reference
🔵	more investigation required to remove uncertainty
⚫	under discussion within the team
⬛	a large work item, larger than one iteration

Accessibility

• Accessibility issues, see query @meganrogge team

Workbench

• 💪 Support JSON file as a policy backend on Linux vscode#148945 @joshspicer
• Allow a setting to open secondary sidebar by default vscode#191202 @bpasero
• Allow to set floating windows always on top vscode#200647 @bpasero
• Allow to set floating windows compact vscode#246411 @bpasero

Code Editor

• Add support for variable line heights vscode#147067 @aiday-mar
• 🏃 Add support for multiple fonts in the editor vscode#237346 @aiday-mar

Notebook Editor / Jupyter Notebooks

• History persistence for notebook find widget vscode#238923 @Yoyokrazy
• Support drag and drop a cell output into the chat vscode#245364 @Yoyokrazy
• 🏃 Explore rendering outputs in separate pane/view/editor vscode#143244 @Yoyokrazy @amunger

Languages / Python

• UX and feedback for Shell Startup Environment Activation vscode-python-environments#227 @karthiknadig
• Fast create for Python Environments (for notebooks, PEP723, etc) vscode-python-environments#258 @karthiknadig
• uv in python devcontainers vscode-python#24961 @karthiknadig
• 💪 Get python for users with no python installed vscode-python#24963 @karthiknadig
• Update Python Environments README.md vscode-python-environments#259 @cwebster-99
• 🏃 "New project" for python work @eleanorjboyd
  • use built-in templates, uv, poetry, conda to create new project templates for flask, fastapi, django, python package, and pep 723 style script vscode-python-environments#285 @eleanorjboyd
  • connect "New Project" to /new for copilot vscode-python-environments#286 @eleanorjboyd @bhavyaus
• Redesign python environment tool and implement this tool and a package install tool for copilot vscode-python-environments#284 @eleanorjboyd
• Add support for branch coverage to python testing vscode-python#24976 @eleanorjboyd

Source Control

• Support diffing all changes in quick diff decorations vscode#60389 @lszomoru

Terminal

• ✋ 🏃 PATH issues when multiple extensions contribute environment vscode#245613 @anthonykim1
• Shell Environment load performance @anthonykim1 vscode#245695 @anthonykim1
• Nushell detection on Windows and Linux vscode#245698 @anthonykim1
• 🏃 Terminal REPL completions using LSP vscode#241167 @anthonykim1

Tasks

• None.

API

• API proposals: query @jrieken @mjbvz
• API finalization: query @jrieken @mjbvz
• Support encoding-related utils in extension host vscode#242547 @bpasero

Extensions

• Enable extension signature verification by default on Linux vscode#239579 @sandy081
• Allow for ESM-extensions (NodeJS EH) vscode#245214 @jrieken

Extension Contributions

• GHPRI: Support Issue view vscode-pull-request-github#6765 @alexr00

GitHub Copilot

• Improve agent mode including improved MCP support @kieferrm team
• Improve next edit suggestions @alexdima team
• 🏃 Make language-specific context available to Copilot inline completions @dbaeumer
• 🏃 💪 Explore anchored quick widget for mouse interactions to attach context vscode#238095 @TylerLeonhardt
• 🏃 MCP: Better discovery/registry and one-click installation flow vscode#245717 @sandy081
• Extensions tools: agentic ability to search and install extensions vscode#245864 @sandy081

Engineering

• 💪 🏃 Support building the monaco-editor AMD variant from new sources vscode#234114 @hediet @alexdima
• Implement the full macOS build job in arm64 @lszomoru
• Parallelize sign and test tasks in Windows, macOS and Linux build jobs vscode#245344 @lszomoru
• Support macOS jobs in PR builds vscode#245345 @lszomoru
• Inline Linux snap build job vscode#245876 @joaomoreno

Electron

• 🏃 Crash issues, see query @deepak1556
• Exploration: Electron 35 vscode#245420 @deepak1556

Documentation

• Update Copilot customization content vscode-docs/issues/8240 @ntrogh
• Add guidance about using Copilot for notebooks vscode-docs#8239 @ntrogh
• ✋ Add guidance to API docs about running MCP server in extension vscode-docs#8216 @ntrogh
• Polish BYOK content vscode-docs#8214 @ntrogh

---

Deferred

• Improve large code cell execution experience vscode#246358 @Yoyokrazy
• Implement package install with permissions for Python Environments vscode-python-environments#136 @karthiknadig @eleanorjboyd
• Experiment with single repo SCM view vscode#245346 @lszomoru
• Support Copilot Chat in web vscode#245860 @bpasero
• Electron: Page content resizes with noticable delay electron#36280 @deepak1556
• Failed to execute 'createScriptURL' on 'TrustedTypePolicy' vscode#240780 @deepak1556
• Migrate from unsupported paste execCommand in desktop vscode#239228 @deepak1556 @aiday-mar
• 🏃 Investigation: Use tree-sitter for grammar colorization vscode#210475 @alexr00 @hediet
• Show Checkout main checkbox in PR creation view vscode-pull-request-github#6706 @alexr00
• 🏃 Update Conpty in VS Code vscode#224488 @Tyriar @deepak1556
• 🏃 Explore GPU rendering of the code editor vscode#221145 @Tyriar @hediet
• 💪 Finalize Related code vscode#126932 @connor4312
• VSCode freezing when adding folder to workspace while working on remote Linux machine vscode-remote-release#10168 @joshspicer
• 💪 Resolve unique connection issues vscode-remote-release#10412, vscode-remote-release#6319, vscode-remote-release#6600 @joshspicer
• ✋ Adopt pre-release extension query API support vscode#243072 @sandy081
• Ensure pipelines can be retriggered vscode#231139 @joaomoreno

[iwangbowen]

Always looking forward to new update

[gjsjohnmurray]

Please give us a status update on FileSearchProvider and TextSearchProvider API finalization prospects.

#240160 (comment)