What is GitHub Copilot?

GitHub Copilot is an integrated AI assistant that supports developers through code completion, conversational coding (Copilot Chat), autonomous coding agents, and smart code reviews. It enhances productivity by understanding context, generating code, editing across files, and integrating with external tools—all within your IDE, terminal, or the GitHub platform. It is a cutting-edge AI tool designed to assist software developers throughout the coding lifecycle. Developed by GitHub in collaboration with OpenAI originally, Copilot integrates directly into popular development environments such as VS Code, Visual Studio, JetBrains IDEs, Xcode, Neovim, Eclipse, and the command-line interface (CLI), offering real-time support and automation.

Figure 12.1: GitHub Copilot is available in these IDEs and environments

At its core, GitHub Copilot functions as an intelligent coding companion. It provides context-aware code suggestions, generates entire...