GitHub Copilot CLI: AI for the Command-Line

Published

May 26, 2023

Reading time
2 min read

📹 The above video demonstraits the GitHub Copilot CLI in the terminal.

Installation

The project isn't yet open to all, but you can sign-up to be on the waiting list.

Once you get access, you can install the @githubnext/github-copilot-cli module from npm. There are instructions on how to install and use the module there as well.

npm install -g @githubnext/github-copilot-cli
github-copilot-cli auth

You'll also want to add the following snippet to your ~/.zshrc file (or associated startup config) and then source it (or create a new termianl tab).

eval "$(github-copilot-cli alias -- "$0")"

Usage

git? specific command

The git? command is specific when you want to generate a command that is related to git.

Here are some examples that I showed from the video...

git? how do i update the message of my last commited
git? i accidentally commited to main, but it needs to be in a branch
replace new-feature with feature-awesome OR branch is feature-awesome
git? how to delete branch locally and on origin
for the feature-awesome branch

gh? specific command

The gh? command is specific when you want to interact with the GitHub gh command-line tool.

Here are some examples that I showed from the video...

gh? list prs
that were created by me
gh? how to i list my public gists and pipe those through fzf with a preview of each gist
edit the gist that is selected
put the preview on the bottom

?? generic command

The ?? command is a generic command that helps you generate any other command that you might want.

Here are some examples that I showed from the video...

?? list global npm packages
?? list top level folders from ~/.config
only show the name

History

The tool registers the commands with your shell's history, so you can pull back up previous commands using your shell!

Works in Any Terminal Emulator

A nice thing about this tool is that it doesn't require you to use a particular terminal emulator. You can use it in whatever emulator you like best!

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