Re:Vscode.dev: Local Development with Cloud Tools
by orangea on Monday July 24, 2023 @09:41PM
(#36856784)
It's true that the sandboxing aspect of vscode.dev and codespaces is a major part of their appeal. It's unfortunate that operating systems were designed with more or less of a "if malicious code is running on your computer, you are already screwed" paradigm, and that part of the reason that running web apps in browsers is such a popular mode of operation is that they don't follow that philosophy.
Onboarding with a remote setup like this can be very quick. Or really — the same tech (devcontainers) can be used locally just as easily with many of the same benefits. The onboarding/dev setup is reduced to building a few containers and getting the code. You don’t have to locally install packages or worry about incompatible versions of tools.
The remote aspect is available because it’s very easy for Microsoft to do with VSCode as an Electron app. Sadly, they are making it more difficult for anyone outside of vscode.dev to have a remote install without using their “tunnel”.