🤖 GitHub Copilot Handbook

A curated collection of GitHub Copilot customizations — instructions, prompts, agents, and skills — ready to drop into your project.

📖 Full documentation: nikiforovall.github.io/github-copilot-rules

Structure

.github/
├── instructions/      # Path-specific coding rules (applyTo patterns)
├── prompts/           # Reusable prompt templates
├── agents/            # Custom agent modes
└── skills/            # Auto-loaded agent capabilities
AGENTS.md              # Workspace-wide agent instructions

What's Included

Instructions

File	Purpose
coding-guidelines	Code generation rules
coding-style	Style & formatting conventions
testing-xunit	Test generation rules
git-message	Conventional commit format

Agents

Agent	Purpose
code-review	Structured code review with prioritized feedback
debug	Systematic bug investigation & resolution
differ	Branch diff analysis & change summaries
research	In-depth research with source synthesis
spec	Interview-driven spec creation

Prompts

Prompt	Purpose
commit	Generate commit messages
reflect	Session retrospective
pros-and-cons	Compare options in table format

Skills

Skill	Purpose
planning-with-files	Persistent multi-session planning
dotnet-test	Run .NET tests with xUnit
dotnet-run-file	Run C# scripts without projects
dotnet-dependency	Audit .NET dependencies

How to Use

1. Copy the files you need into your project's .github/ directory
2. Configure .vscode/settings.json:

{
  "chat.useAgentsMdFile": true,
  "github.copilot.chat.commitMessageGeneration.instructions": [
    { "file": ".github/instructions/git-message.instructions.md" }
  ],
  "github.copilot.chat.reviewSelection.enabled": true,
  "github.copilot.chat.reviewSelection.instructions": [
    { "file": ".github/instructions/coding-guidelines.instructions.md" },
    { "file": ".github/instructions/coding-style.instructions.md" }
  ],
  "github.copilot.chat.testGeneration.instructions": [
    { "file": ".github/instructions/testing-xunit.instructions.md" }
  ]
}

Tip

Customize the rules to fit your team's workflow. See Awesome Copilot for more inspiration.

Credits

Inspired by https://github.com/Aaronontheweb/dotnet-cursor-rules