Docker, VSCode/DevContainers, Copilot, and GitHub Education Setup

This course will depend upon a few powerful, industry tools to help us ensure a consistent development environment for everyone in the course.

You will need to install:

  1. Docker Desktop (be sure you can successfully run the command docker run hello-world in your terminal)
  2. Visual Studio Code
  3. The DevContainer Extension for VSCode (Update your VSCode if you have not done so recently!)
  4. The Github Copilot Extension for VSCode (May be installed automatically in recent versions of VSCode)

Additionally, you need to register for GitHub Student benefits to give you free AI coding assistant credits and other benefits. You can find the sign-up here: https://education.github.com/pack. Please note that the ID verification can be a little finicky. These are some steps that recently worked for one of our TAs:

  1. I found a dark background to put my ID up against (it failed when I was holding it in my hand)
  2. I taped my student ID to the dark background and held it up close to my computer
  3. I got approved in like 30 seconds

Finally, you should update your GitHub Profile to include your real name and, ideally, a representative profile photo of yourself. This will help the COMP423 team, and your team mates, identify your profile. Further, it is common for recruiters and software engineering teams to review candidate profiles when interviewing. Treating your GitHub profile with some professionalism will serve you well.

After you have completed your profile and have successfully signed up for the GitHub Student Developer pack, go back to VS Code and be sure you are logged into your GitHub Account. There is a little icon in the bottom left corner of VSCode with a person it it you can click to see what profile you are logged in with.

If you have troubles, come see us during drop-in office hours.

To test that Copilot is successfully installed, open your command palette, search for "Chat: Open Chat". Change the mode in the chat (first drop down) to "Ask" and select the model (second drop down) "GPT-5 mini". Try asking "What are your capabilities in VSCode?" Upload a screenshot of your copilot chat's response to the Gradescope assignment.