Enable File‑Write Capabilities for Custom Agents in Visual Studio Copilot Chat

[anand08151947-dot]

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Summary
Custom Agents in Visual Studio + GitHub Copilot Chat currently cannot perform file‑write operations (create, update, modify, patch). Any attempt results in:
“File-write tools aren’t available in this chat session, so I can’t directly create/update the repo-root shared context file.”

This limitation prevents custom agents from delivering meaningful automation and significantly reduces their usefulness inside the IDE.

💡 Why This Matters
Custom agents are positioned as a way to extend Copilot with domain‑specific intelligence. However, without file‑write capabilities, they cannot:

• Apply code transformations
• Generate new files or scaffolding
• Refactor or migrate codebases
• Implement multi-step workflows
• Produce end-to-end outcomes
  This forces developers into awkward two‑step workflows:
• Custom agent generates content
• User manually asks the workspace agent to apply it
  This breaks flow, reduces trust in the agent, and undermines the promise of agentic automation.

🔍 Current Behavior

• Custom agents can read files
• Custom agents can navigate the workspace
• Custom agents cannot write, even when the user explicitly requests it
• Built‑in agents can write, but cannot be extended or customized
  This creates an inconsistent capability model that limits real-world adoption.

🎯 Requested Enhancement
Enable opt‑in file‑write capabilities for custom agents in Visual Studio Copilot Chat.
Proposed approaches (any would work):

• Capability flag in copilot-agent.json (e.g., "allowFileWrite": true)
• User consent prompt the first time an agent attempts a write
• Workspace-scoped permissions (e.g., allow writes only inside /src or /generated)
• Rate-limited or patch-only writes for safety
  This keeps security intact while unlocking real automation.

🧭 Why This Is Safe
Developers already trust built‑in agents with write access.
Custom agents:

• Are explicitly installed by the user
• Are local to the workspace
• Can be sandboxed with capability flags
• Can require explicit user approval
  This is no different from installing a VS extension or running a code generator.

📈 Impact
Enabling file‑write access would immediately unlock:

• Project scaffolding agents
• Refactoring and migration agents
• Documentation generators
• Code-quality and compliance agents
• Domain-specific “AI workers” that deliver outcomes, not text
  This is the difference between “AI as a responder” and AI as an actual developer assistant.

🙏 Request
Please consider enabling file‑write capabilities for custom agents, even behind an experimental flag. This would dramatically expand what developers can build and would align Visual Studio with the emerging ecosystem of agentic developer tools.
Happy to provide additional use cases, examples, or test scenarios.

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