Visual Studio Code March 2025 update gives you agent mode, better accesibility and more

Microsoft has just released the March 2025 (version 1.99) update for its extremely popular code editor, Visual Studio Code. Like all VS Code updates, this one comes with plenty of improvements. Here's an overview of the main changes in this update:

• Agent Mode in VS Code Stable: Enables autonomous task completion by Copilot, enable it by setting chat.agent.enabled.
• Model Context Protocol (MCP) Server Support: Allows AI models to interact with external tools and data sources.
• Built-in Tools for Agent Mode: Includes features for fetching web content, finding symbol references, and deep analysis.
• Next Edit Suggestions Now Generally Available: Provides predictive code editing assistance.
• Reduced Distractions During AI Edits: Minimizes diagnostics events while AI applies edits.
• Support for Custom API Keys in Chat (Preview): Allows access to various language models using personal API keys.
• Unified Chat Experience: Simplifies switching between ask, edit, and agent modes.
• Improved Workspace Search: Offers faster and more accurate remote workspace indexing.
• Enhanced Notebook Editing: Supports creating and editing notebooks with edit and agent modes.

Some of the big updates in this update pertain to accessibility. If you’re a screen reader user, Microsoft has made the editor and terminal more compatible with readers. Additionally, Microsoft has made changes so that the Command Center and Quick Access announce the focused element’s type and state, and the Problems view now announces the error, warning, or info message.

Another change affects anyone who uses Git, which is a significant majority. The Source Control view now shows you how many incoming and outgoing commits there are for each repository, giving developers a quick overview of the status of their repositories.

Finally, there are improvements to extensions. The Python extension now supports the Pylance language server by default, giving you improved code completion, navigation, and error checking. The Jupyter extension has also got an update so that data scientists and researchers can run notebooks in a remote Jupyter server.

You can now download this version by going to the Visual Studio Code website or checking for updates inside an older version of Visual Studio Code.

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