Monte Chan talks about “GitHub Copilot & AI-Assisted Coding (Unlocking ColdFusion's AI Potential)” in this episode of ColdFusion Alive Podcast with host Michaela Light.

“It is an AI pair programming tool. So this helps test your programming that basically, there's another person but in this case is a AI tool, if you will, so but you will be doing most of the typing. But then that will also give you some code suggestions, if you will. And to help you with coding. So sometimes can be a short one liner, or could be one whole block of codes. So you can save a lot of typing.”

https://youtu.be/nk27Pr03lXg

Show notes

What is Github Copilot?

An AI pair programmer.

Essentially, Copilot is Auto Complete on steroid. When Copilot generates the codes, it does not know what it is writing.  It is simply trying to predict the next word(s) based upon the information that it has.

Works with VS Code, Visual Studio, NeoVim/Vim, and JetBrains IDEs via extensions

https://docs.github.com/en/copilot/overview-of-github-copilot/about-github-copilot-for-individuals 

Who makes it?

Microsoft who own Github

Why should CFers use Copilot

Helps you write code faster especially when it generate a whole block of code

Write better code esp if your give it self-documenting variable and function names

Can help with JavaScript, CSS and SQl too

Improves a junior developer’s weak area more than it improves a senior developer. 

“Copilot makes you better at what you’re good at and lets you quickly master what you’ve yet to learn.”

“Among developers who use GitHub Copilot, 88% say they are more productive, 74% say that they can focus on more satisfying work, and 77% say it helps them spend less time searching for information or examples.” from https://github.blog/2022-09-07-research-quantifying-github-copilots-impact-on-developer-productivity-and-happiness/

Any reasons to not use it?

Trained on codes found in public repositories – The accuracy of the generated codes depends on the amount of codes in their respective public repos.

The quality of the codes may or may not be good 

It takes the name of your file, the codes before and/or after the cursor in the current file, the currently open files in your IDE, and the codes in the files linked to the current file in context when trying to provide code suggestions.  In other words, as you are building your projects, the accuracy rate should increase.

Does it copy your code to add to its store of code?

Controversy over where the code comes from - copyright issues?

Business version has option to only use code from a your own private GitHub repo

Tips on using Copilot

Be precise and provide details

Be descriptive to your file names, variable names, function names, …etc.

Keep file tabs open especially those files which are relating to the current file.

Keep in mind that Github Copilot is like an Auto-Complete on steroid.  It does not have an idea in which language you are writing.  

The suggested code may not have the correct syntax (ex. Missing a bracket, missing a semicolon, …etc.) or the suggested variables/functions may not exist.

So! Read and test the code generated!

Github Copilot is trained on data found in public repositories.  

So! Put more ColdFusion codes in public repositories.

ForgeBox? Mirror into public GitHub or write an extension

Explain code

Simple bug fixing

Translate code to/from other programming

Demo

Pricing

30 day trial

$10 per month for individuals; $19 for business license per user/mo

Copilot Business comes with Copilot Chat

More on features and differences between individual and business versions https://docs.github.com/en/copilot/overview-of-github-copilot/about-github-copilot-for-individuals 

Has Copilot changed the way your team approaches coding or collaboration?