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How to Use GitHub Copilot's Hidden Features for a Faster Dev Workflow

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GitHub Copilot, Microsoft's AI coding assistant, offers several advanced features inside Visual Studio Code that go beyond basic code suggestions. Developers can significantly improve output quality by writing detailed, specific prompts instead of vague ones, and can even use tools like ChatGPT to help structure complex requests before passing them to Copilot. The tool also supports custom Markdown rule files — such as AGENTS.md and .github/copilot-instructions.md — that let teams save persistent project-specific instructions so they don't have to repeat context in every chat session. Path-specific instruction files can further tailor Copilot's behavior depending on which part of the codebase is being edited. Additionally, VS Code's integrated browser can be paired with Copilot to enable AI-assisted debugging without leaving the editor.

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