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Auto-installing VS Code Extensions

Practicus AI Workers can automatically install VS Code extensions every time you start a new Worker, even without internet access.

How it Works

By placing downloaded .vsix extension files into your extensions directory, Practicus AI ensures that they are installed in the background the next time VS Code starts inside a Worker.

Steps

  1. Open the open-source VS Code extensions store, Open VSX.

(This is the same marketplace used when installing directly from the VS Code Extensions pane.)

  1. Search for the extension you want, then click Download. If asked,

  2. Choose Linux X64

  3. Or, choose Linux ARM if you are running on an ARM-based Practicus AI Worker.

  4. Save the downloaded .vsix file into the extensions folder ~/my/settings/extensions/

  5. To test: create a new Worker and open VS Code.

Since extensions are installed in the background, you may need to click Extensions and then Reload Window to complete activation.

Shared extensions

To save on disk space and avoid downloading the same extension multiple times, an admin can create and upload extensions in a shared extensions folder.

All .vsix files placed into the shared directory (for example, ~/shared/extensions/) can be symlinked into each user’s personal folder (~/my/settings/extensions/).

Example setup:

Run the below inside the worker to create a symlink to a shared extension.

ln -s ~/shared/extensions/some_extension.vsix ~/my/settings/extensions/

To link all extensions

ln -s ~/shared/extensions/*.vsix ~/my/settings/extensions/

After this, each Worker will automatically install extensions from the shared folder via the symlinks and updating a .vsix file in the shared folder instantly updates it for all users.

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