Remote: Iteration Plan for June 2019

[kieferrm]

This plan captures our work on the Remote development extensions in June. We follow the same iteration cycle as VS Code. Although we plan for a whole iteration, we not only ship at the end of an iteration but throughout.

We'll focus stability, improving the first time user experience, and overall polishing.

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

UX

• Add Close Connection Add command to bring me to no-remote context #501 @aeschli
• Make it easier for first time users to understand that they are in a remote context Prompt to open a folder after connecting to a SSH host #511 @isidorn

Remote - Core

• Fallback to stream extensions from the client to the server when marketplace access fails Handle Proxy Issues on Remote  #231 @sandy081
• File: Save As should support to save remote files on the local machine File Save As should support show local #712 @alexr00
• Support DnD of local files and folders into the file explorer in a remote context Support DnD of local files and folders into the remote file explorer #627 @isidorn
• Since it is not possible to copy a folder from remote using DnD (Chrome limitation) there will be a separate command contributed on folders 'Download to Local...' @isidorn
• Handle 127.0.0.1:port just like localhost:port in WebViews 127.0.0.1:port should be mapped as well as localhost:port in WebView #108 @mjbvz
• Provide ARM32 server support Please add support for ARM (and Raspberry Pi) #13 @joaomoreno

Remote - SSH

• Improve handling of password authentication (reduced # of connections, prompt for password) remote SSH, not prompted for password ? #513 @roblourens
• Improve how to handle disconnected/broken windows Improve handling broken windows using SSH extension #641 @roblourens
• Take down VS Code Server processes when there are no clients Clean up agent processes from old vscode versions #203 @roblourens
• Improve find SSH binary on Window clients Look for common ssh command locations if ssh not found in the path #448 @roblourens
• Move connection history from explorer extension to SSH core extension Missing entries in SSH explorer #638 @kieferrm
• Add command Remote-SSH: Show Log Remote-SSH: Show Log missing  #639 @kieferrm
• 🏃 Explore support for SSH Agent forwarding Does not support agent forwarding - committing on remote host via SSH fails #16 @roblourens

Remote - Containers

• Improve logic in determining where to install agent (better $HOME detection) Determine install folder from within the container #22 @chrmarti
• Pick up default shell from /etc/passwd if $SHELL not set and not overridden in VS Code settings Pick up default shell from /etc/passwd if $SHELL not set and not overridden in VS Code settings #521 @chrmarti
• Polish: Update name of Remote-Containers: Add Container Configuration File command Name of Remote-Containers: Add Container Configuration File... command misleading? #266 @chrmarti
• Add command Remote-Containers: Show Log Add command Remote-Containers: Show Log #673 @chrmarti
• Improve test coverage for Remote-Containers Improve test coverage for Remote-Containers #674 @chrmarti
• Alpine Linux support Support Alpine #54 @chrmarti

Remote - WSL

• Support multiple Linux distros WSL: Add multi distro support #118 @aeschli
• Reenable file watcher logging to track down Remote WSL: Source Control not showing changed files #314 SCM doesn't show changed files @aeschli
• Download VS Code server from VS Code to address Unable to download vscode server from WSL #79 @aeschli
• Investigate into work around for WSL 1 limitation that you cannot rename non-empty folders VSCode Remote WSL: unable to rename folder #208 @aeschli

Extension Contributions

• Help to migrate the partner and most important extensions to use machine-scoped settings @sandy081
• Investigate Chrome debug extension support for Remote https://github.com/microsoft/vscode-chrome-debug/issues/832 @roblourens

Engineering

• Support/publish Nightly/insiders version
  • Remote-SSH @roblourens
  • 🏃 Remote-Containers Support/publish Nightly/insiders version #675 @chrmarti

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Deferred Items

• Align output channels/terminals across the remote extensions
• 💪 Explore further improvements to password authentication Explore ways to reduce number of SSH connections needed to connect a window using the SSH extension #642 @roblourens
• 💪 Explore connection sharing between windows that connect to the same host ControlMaster is not supported on Windows - find a workaround or document it #96 @roblourens
• Support/publish Nightly/insiders version for Remote-WSL @aeschli

[positivedefinite]

Dear dev team of vscode-remote,

This extension changed my life. I build NLP solutions on AWS. My lifestyle is typical for a digital nomad, I work from at least 3 different locations every week and I move a lot with public transport. My device of choice has been MS Surface Pro 3 with i7. It makes all the difference in the world that I can now run my code directly on EC2 and that VSCode takes 700 MB of RAM and not 2.5GB. For the early stage extension that vscode-remote is, I have had an absolutely fantastic experience with it in the past 3 weeks.

Keep up the good work!