Remove confusing GitHub repository tip from chat tips

[Copilot]

The tip.githubRepo tip ("Mention a GitHub repository (@owner/repo) in your prompt to let the agent search code…") was confusing — the underlying tool may not exist or be enabled, and the tip checked for tool registration rather than enablement, making it appear even when users couldn't use the feature.

Remove the tip and its associated dead infrastructure:

• Remove tip.githubRepo from the tips array
• Remove excludeWhenAnyToolSetToolInvoked and requiresAnyToolSetRegistered from ITipDefinition (only used by this tip)
• Remove _monitoredToolSets tracking and simplify the tool invocation listener
• Remove 3 related tests and unused imports

Warning

Firewall rules blocked me from connecting to one or more addresses (expand for details)

I tried to connect to the following addresses, but was blocked by firewall rules:

• disallowed.com
  • Triggering command: /proc/self/exe /proc/self/exe --type=utility --utility-sub-type=network.mojom.NetworkService --lang=en-US --service-sandbox-type=none --no-sandbox --crashpad-handler-pid=8330 --enable-crash-reporter=a88c5e1e-3526-43f9-acfb-c8c420dd3125,no_channel --user-data-dir=/tmp/vscode-tests-1770992590551 --shared-files=v8_context_snapshot_data:100 --field-trial-handle=3,i,17328118468219051011,14408255974118093813,262144 --enable-features=PdfUseShowSaveFilePicker --disable-features=LocalNetworkAccessChecks,ScreenAIOCREnabled,SpareRendererForSitePerProcess,TraceSiteInstanceGetProcessCreation --variations-seed-version --trace-process-track-uuid=3190708989122997041 in/sh alse --sourceMapsh (dns block)
  • Triggering command: .build/electron/code-oss .build/electron/code-oss test/unit/electron/index.js --crash-reporter-directory=/home/REDACTED/work/vscode/vscode/.build/crashes src/vs/workbench/contrib/chat/test/browser/chatTipService.test.ts /opt�� -forwarding/tscofalse /tsconfig.json in/sh eSources false --sourceMap node /opt�� ript-language-features/web/tsconfig.json --pretty false --sourceMap --inlineSources --project pescript/native-preview-linux-x64/lib/tsgo ourceMap --inlinsh false --sourceMap pescript/native-preview-linux-x64/lib/tsgo (dns block)
• example.com
  • Triggering command: /proc/self/exe /proc/self/exe --type=utility --utility-sub-type=network.mojom.NetworkService --lang=en-US --service-sandbox-type=none --no-sandbox --crashpad-handler-pid=8330 --enable-crash-reporter=a88c5e1e-3526-43f9-acfb-c8c420dd3125,no_channel --user-data-dir=/tmp/vscode-tests-1770992590551 --shared-files=v8_context_snapshot_data:100 --field-trial-handle=3,i,17328118468219051011,14408255974118093813,262144 --enable-features=PdfUseShowSaveFilePicker --disable-features=LocalNetworkAccessChecks,ScreenAIOCREnabled,SpareRendererForSitePerProcess,TraceSiteInstanceGetProcessCreation --variations-seed-version --trace-process-track-uuid=3190708989122997041 in/sh alse --sourceMapsh (dns block)
  • Triggering command: .build/electron/code-oss .build/electron/code-oss test/unit/electron/index.js --crash-reporter-directory=/home/REDACTED/work/vscode/vscode/.build/crashes src/vs/workbench/contrib/chat/test/browser/chatTipService.test.ts /opt�� -forwarding/tscofalse /tsconfig.json in/sh eSources false --sourceMap node /opt�� ript-language-features/web/tsconfig.json --pretty false --sourceMap --inlineSources --project pescript/native-preview-linux-x64/lib/tsgo ourceMap --inlinsh false --sourceMap pescript/native-preview-linux-x64/lib/tsgo (dns block)
• mobile.events.data.microsoft.com
  • Triggering command: /proc/self/exe /proc/self/exe --type=utility --utility-sub-type=network.mojom.NetworkService --lang=en-US --service-sandbox-type=none --no-sandbox --crashpad-handler-pid=8330 --enable-crash-reporter=a88c5e1e-3526-43f9-acfb-c8c420dd3125,no_channel --user-data-dir=/tmp/vscode-tests-1770992590551 --shared-files=v8_context_snapshot_data:100 --field-trial-handle=3,i,17328118468219051011,14408255974118093813,262144 --enable-features=PdfUseShowSaveFilePicker --disable-features=LocalNetworkAccessChecks,ScreenAIOCREnabled,SpareRendererForSitePerProcess,TraceSiteInstanceGetProcessCreation --variations-seed-version --trace-process-track-uuid=3190708989122997041 in/sh alse --sourceMapsh (dns block)
  • Triggering command: .build/electron/code-oss .build/electron/code-oss test/unit/electron/index.js --crash-reporter-directory=/home/REDACTED/work/vscode/vscode/.build/crashes src/vs/workbench/contrib/chat/test/browser/chatTipService.test.ts /opt�� -forwarding/tscofalse /tsconfig.json in/sh eSources false --sourceMap node /opt�� ript-language-features/web/tsconfig.json --pretty false --sourceMap --inlineSources --project pescript/native-preview-linux-x64/lib/tsgo ourceMap --inlinsh false --sourceMap pescript/native-preview-linux-x64/lib/tsgo (dns block)
• redirector.gvt1.com
  • Triggering command: /proc/self/exe /proc/self/exe --type=utility --utility-sub-type=network.mojom.NetworkService --lang=en-US --service-sandbox-type=none --no-sandbox --crashpad-handler-pid=6729 --enable-crash-reporter=a88c5e1e-3526-43f9-acfb-c8c420dd3125,no_channel --user-data-dir=/tmp/vscode-tests-1770992417703 --shared-files=v8_context_snapshot_data:100 --field-trial-handle=3,i,18271820631563000977,17773168110128866251,262144 --enable-features=PdfUseShowSaveFilePicker --disable-features=LocalNetworkAccessChecks,ScreenAIOCREnabled,SpareRendererForSitePerProcess,TraceSiteInstanceGetProcessCreation --variations-seed-version --trace-process-track-uuid=3190708989122997041 (dns block)
  • Triggering command: .build/electron/code-oss .build/electron/code-oss test/unit/electron/index.js --crash-reporter-directory=/home/REDACTED/work/vscode/vscode/.build/crashes src/vs/workbench/contrib/chat/test/browser/chatTipService.test.ts (dns block)
  • Triggering command: /proc/self/exe /proc/self/exe --type=utility --utility-sub-type=network.mojom.NetworkService --lang=en-US --service-sandbox-type=none --no-sandbox --crashpad-handler-pid=8330 --enable-crash-reporter=a88c5e1e-3526-43f9-acfb-c8c420dd3125,no_channel --user-data-dir=/tmp/vscode-tests-1770992590551 --shared-files=v8_context_snapshot_data:100 --field-trial-handle=3,i,17328118468219051011,14408255974118093813,262144 --enable-features=PdfUseShowSaveFilePicker --disable-features=LocalNetworkAccessChecks,ScreenAIOCREnabled,SpareRendererForSitePerProcess,TraceSiteInstanceGetProcessCreation --variations-seed-version --trace-process-track-uuid=3190708989122997041 in/sh alse --sourceMapsh (dns block)

If you need me to access, download, or install something from one of these locations, you can either:

• Configure Actions setup steps to set up my environment, which run before the firewall is enabled
• Add the appropriate URLs or hosts to the custom allowlist in this repository's Copilot coding agent settings (admins only)

Original prompt

---

This section details on the original issue you should resolve

<issue_title>Confusing tip</issue_title>
<issue_description>It's not clear to me what feature this is actually referring to? Using github mcp? Something that the PR extension contributes?

</issue_description>

<agent_instructions>Remove the tip about github </agent_instructions>

Comments on the Issue (you are @copilot in this section)

@meganrogge Here's what this applies to now, it should probably hide when any tool from either of these toolsets is invoked, not just when one of this small set of tools has been run.

vscode/src/vs/workbench/contrib/chat/browser/chatTipService.ts

Lines 213 to 215 in 252f81c

	excludeWhenToolsInvoked: ['github-pull-request_doSearch', 'github-pull-request_issue_fetch', 'github-pull-request_formSearchQuery'],
	requiresAnyToolSetRegistered: ['github', 'github-pull-request'],
	},

Re what we say here, @digitarald thoughts on the language?</comment_new>
<comment_new>@digitarald
Fwiw, the tool would is built-in web/githubRepo</comment_new>
<comment_new>@roblourens
I don't think that tool exists anymore?

or it's hidden by default?

Also, the tip is still not correct. Mentioning a repo does not "let" the agent do something. I don't have those tools enabled. It looks like you are checking for the tools being registered not enabled for a request</comment_new>
<comment_new>@digitarald
Ah, welcome to the club. I asked around today and others still see it. I was trying to debug with Matt why I don't see it.</comment_new>
<comment_new>@meganrogge
Ok, going to remove that tip for now </comment_new>

• Fixes Confusing tip #294723

---

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[Copilot]

Pull request overview

This PR removes the confusing tip.githubRepo chat tip and its associated dead infrastructure. The tip was misleading because it suggested users could mention GitHub repositories (@owner/repo) to enable agent features, but the underlying tool may not exist or be enabled. The tip also checked for tool registration rather than enablement, causing it to appear even when users couldn't use the feature.

Changes:

• Removed the tip.githubRepo tip definition from the tip catalog
• Removed unused properties excludeWhenAnyToolSetToolInvoked and requiresAnyToolSetRegistered from the ITipDefinition interface
• Simplified tool invocation tracking by removing _monitoredToolSets infrastructure and streamlining the listener logic
• Removed 3 related tests and cleaned up unused imports (IToolData, ToolDataSource)

Reviewed changes

Copilot reviewed 2 out of 2 changed files in this pull request and generated no comments.

File	Description
src/vs/workbench/contrib/chat/browser/chatTipService.ts	Removed tip.githubRepo from catalog, deleted excludeWhenAnyToolSetToolInvoked and requiresAnyToolSetRegistered properties from ITipDefinition, simplified tool listener by removing tool set monitoring logic
src/vs/workbench/contrib/chat/test/browser/chatTipService.test.ts	Removed 3 tests related to tool set registration and monitoring, cleaned up unused imports