Command links don't work in the in-workspace onboarding

[mikenikles]

Bug description

Links such as command:gitpod.ports.reveal have their href elements stripped. Thanks @filiptronicek for investigating that.

Screenshot

Steps to reproduce

1. Select "VS Code Insiders" as your preferred IDE at https://gitpod.io/preferences
2. Open a new Gitpod workspace
3. Notice the new "Get Started" onboarding experience
4. Click "Open ports" on the left-side
5. In the content that opens to the right, click the "Click here to open the panel" link

Other places with command links:

• Full access to a terminal
• VS Code desktop support

Workspace affected

No response

Expected behavior

The commands execute, i.e. the "Remote Explorer" panel opens and displays the ports.

Example repository

All

Anything else?

No response

[filiptronicek]

https://github.com/microsoft/vscode-extension-samples/blob/main/getting-started-sample/media/windows.md?plain=1#L3 it looks like this way of triggering commands is both completely valid and encouraged, no idea why the commands are just not rendering as links, maybe it is checking somewhere for MD URLs and if a link isn't a valid URL, then it just deletes it 😕.

[loujaybee]

Given that this will flow into stable soon we should look to get the links either fixed, or removed to avoid confusion.

/schedule

[roboquat]

@loujaybee: Issue scheduled in the IDE team (WIP: 0)

In response to this:

Given that this will flow into stable soon we should look to get the links either fixed, or removed to avoid confusion.

/schedule

Instructions for interacting with me using PR comments are available here. If you have questions or suggestions related to my behavior, please file an issue against the kubernetes/test-infra repository.

[filiptronicek]

Wondering if maybe it's a problem with our build step, with it stripping any invalid links.

[filiptronicek]

Okay, that's not what's most likely not what's happening here: when I bundle the extension with Gulp, the resulting markdown is the same as before the build.

[filiptronicek]

Installing the .vsix locally it is obvious this is a universal issue, even on the desktop version of VS Code are the links stripped. @mikenikles were the links ever working during testing? I would love to investigate what's changed from then.

[mikenikles]

Yes, when I developed it, I previewed port 3000 and verified all command links.

I am at a loss as to what has changed to be honest. Something upstream maybe?!

[filiptronicek]

Tested a bunch of things today and this issue occurs with the official example for Walkthroughs. I reported this issue to microsoft/vscode#135505.

[loujaybee]

@filiptronicek If the issue is with upstream, can we remove/modify the links for now (and revert / re-implement when the functionality is working again) to avoid introducing the broken links?

[filiptronicek]

@loujaybee we could change the walkthrough a bit to only use action buttons for these links, avoiding the need to ever have them in the markdown, but this will require some changes in the overall format of the walkthroughs.

A sample action button example: (used by most other walkthroughs today)

[akosyakov]

It is important that it is fixed before October 29.

[mikenikles]

There's an open PR to address the issue upstream: microsoft/vscode#135629

[filiptronicek]

There's an open PR to address the issue upstream: microsoft/vscode#135629

A fix is ready to be merged here: gitpod-io/openvscode-server#176