Codespaces Configuration with the Dev Container Editor

Adding a configuration for Codespaces involves adding a Development Container to a repository and editing it to meet your needs. Previously, a dev container configuration could either be written manually or created with a VS Code extension. We have now added the ability to create or edit a configuration directly from the Code drop down on a GitHub repository page.

Whether you use this mechanism, or you already have a dev container in your repository, you can now edit that configuration within GitHub using the new configuration editor. To open the editor from the code view in a repository, click the pencil icon while viewing a devcontainer.json file.

You are now editing the devcontainer.json file in place in the browser. The dev container needs to conform to the Development Container specification. The editor makes using dev container Features easy. Dev container Features provide reusable configurations for Codespaces created from the repository. Browse available features from right side of the dev container editor.

To use a dev container feature, copy the snippet of json and place it in the features object of your devcontainer.json file. Once you have the features you want, commit those changes to the repository by clicking the "Start commit" button.

We hope this will make configuring your repositories for Codespaces significantly easier.