Visual Studio Code

I created this set of instructions for people to follow.

#1) First make sure you are using an account with full System Administrator privileges to install (all) your tools.

Download and Install VSCode

• Go to the Visual Studio Code download page: https://code.visualstudio.com/download
• Choose and download the SYSTEM INSTALLER version that matches your OS (Windows, Linux, or macOS).
• WARNING: *(DO NOT USE the "User Installer", because it will bury packages into an under-privileged "regular user" directory: "%HOMEPATH%\AppData\Local\Programs\Microsoft VS Code\", which will cause problems and make debugging work much harder later.)* MAKE SURE TO CHOOSE THE "SYSTEM INSTALLER"
• Run installer and pay close attention to the prompts in the setup wizard.
• Verify System Installer uses location "C:\Program Files\Microsoft VS Code".
• As a system administrator, you can check the boxes that add VSCode to your system PATH and that create a desktop icon.
• Once the installation is complete, you can launch VSCode.

Configure VSCode

• After launching VSCode, you can customize it to your liking. You can install and change themes, keybindings, settings, and more by going to File > Preferences and editing the ominous settings.json file. (do this later because Copilot can help you tweak 100s of settings in VSCode.
• You can also install extensions to add more functionality to VSCode. Extensions can be installed from the Extensions view, which can be opened by clicking on the Extensions icon in the Activity Bar on the side of the window.

Installing GitHub Copilot

• Open the Extensions view in VSCode.
• Search for "GitHub Copilot".
• Click on the Install button.

Create a GitHub Account (if you don't already have one.)

• Go to the GitHub signup page: https://github.com/join
• Fill out the form with your desired username, email address, and password.
• Click on the "Create account" button.
• Follow the prompts to complete the account creation process.

Enable GitHub Copilot

• After installing the GitHub Copilot extension in VSCode, it should be enabled by default. You can check if it's enabled by going to File > Preferences > Extensions, find GitHub Copilot, and make sure the checkbox next to it is checked.
• You MUST sign in to your GitHub account for GitHub Copilot to work. To do this click on the GitHub icon in the Activity Bar, then click on "Sign in to GitHub.com" button.

How to Use GitHub Copilot

• To start using GitHub Copilot, simply add a comment in a file in VSCode editor window or Jupyter Notebook that describes the functionality you want it to generate, hit Enter, wait a few seconds, and GitHub Copilot will automatically generate code and suggest completions as you type.
• Accept a suggestion by pressing Tab or Enter, or ignore it and continue typing.
• Manually trigger suggestions by pressing Ctrl+Enter.
• Watch some of the MANY YouTube videos to learn dozens of tips and tricks on how to be super-productive with Copilot.

Remember, as a system administrator, you might need to provide administrator permissions at various steps in this process.