Folder-scoped copilot-instructions.md

[alvaromartmart]

Using a copilot_instructions.md is a great way of improving the performance of Github copilot and ensure suggestions consistent with a team or project own standards.

However, there are situations where multiple, different copilot_instructions might be relevant for different folders in a repo: e.g. in monorepos that might contain a java backend or several frontend applications using different frameworks.
In those cases, specifying folder-specific instructions in the single copilot_instructions can be tricky and perform worse.

It would be great if Github copilot supported folder-scoped copilot_instructions, in the same way that e.g. .gitignore or .dockerignore files can be scoped inside a folder hierarchy, so that they would be picked up by copilot when generating code based on the relevant files in the context.

Example:

.github/copilot_instructions.md
frontend/.github/copilot_instructions.md
backend/.github/copilot_instructions.md

• When generating completions with frontend/file1 in context, copilot would take both .github/copilot_instructions.md and frontend/.github/copilot_instructions.md
• When generating completions with frontend/file1 and backend/file2 in context, copilot would take all

[aeschli]

Thanks for the suggestion.
Completions are not yet using the instruction files, only the chats. And for the chats its not so easy to know where the changes will happen.
So the currently chosen approach is put the folder specific instructions in the global instruction file:
Something like:
When working in 'frontend' use the Xy framework

[vs-code-engineering]

This feature request is now a candidate for our backlog. The community has 60 days to upvote the issue. If it receives 10 upvotes we will move it to our backlog. If not, we will close it. To learn more about how we handle feature requests, please see our documentation.

Happy Coding!

[vs-code-engineering]

This feature request has not yet received the 10 community upvotes it takes to make to our backlog. 10 days to go. To learn more about how we handle feature requests, please see our documentation.

Happy Coding

[helmut-hoffer-von-ankershoffen]

This is quite important for mono and polyrepos, so +1.

[Adamantish]

"for the chats its not so easy to know where the changes will happen"

True. But typically the user will choose files only inside one team/component folder with no ambiguity about which instructions to choose. Would it be possible to build for that case with graceful degradation in the case it's not possible?

[aeschli]

We now also have the prompt files. They can be stored in the workspace and added as context in the chat view.

That's one click more, but gives you control over what's in your prompt.

[vs-code-engineering]

🙁 In the last 60 days, this feature request has received less than 10 community upvotes and we closed it. Still a big Thank You to you for taking the time to create this issue! To learn more about how we handle feature requests, please see our documentation.

Happy Coding!