Track: Copilot Essentials¶
Target Audience: Teams just starting with GitHub Copilot Duration: 15 hours (5 sessions × 3 hrs) Difficulty: Beginner → Intermediate Recommended Delivery: 2 days (2–3 sessions per day)
Description¶
The minimum viable path to Copilot productivity. This track covers everything a team needs to go from zero to confidently using Copilot in their daily workflow — installation, core features, prompt engineering, and the CLI experience. Trainees leave ready to use Copilot effectively across IDE and terminal surfaces.
Prerequisites¶
- Working knowledge of at least one programming language
- GitHub account with Copilot access
- VS Code installed
- Basic Git proficiency
Sessions¶
| Order | Session # | Title | Difficulty | Duration |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 01 | Introduction to GitHub Copilot | Beginner | 3 hrs |
| 2 | 02 | Copilot Chat & Inline Suggestions | Beginner | 3 hrs |
| 3 | 03 | Prompt Engineering Fundamentals | Beginner | 3 hrs |
| 4 | 04 | GitHub Copilot in the CLI | Intermediate | 3 hrs |
| 5 | 05 | Agent Mode in the IDE | Intermediate | 3 hrs |
Recommended Delivery Schedule¶
2-Day Intensive¶
| Day | Sessions | Focus |
|---|---|---|
| Day 1 | Sessions 01, 02, 03 | Foundations: setup, Chat, prompting |
| Day 2 | Sessions 04, 05 | Surfaces: CLI and agent mode |
3-Day Relaxed¶
| Day | Sessions | Focus |
|---|---|---|
| Day 1 | Sessions 01, 02 | Setup and Chat workflows |
| Day 2 | Session 03 | Prompt engineering deep dive |
| Day 3 | Sessions 04, 05 | CLI and agent mode |
Learning Outcomes¶
By completing this track, trainees will be able to:
- Install, configure, and use GitHub Copilot across IDE and CLI surfaces
- Use Copilot Chat, inline suggestions, and Next Edit Suggestions in daily workflows
- Write effective prompts that produce accurate, useful Copilot output
- Use standalone
copilotin the terminal for command explanation and generation - Use agent mode for multi-step, multi-file coding tasks
- Explain Copilot's capabilities and limitations to their teams
Next Steps¶
- Developer Productivity — Add code review and Spaces to maximize daily output
- Agentic Development — Go deep into autonomous agents, MCP, and custom agents
- DevOps & Automation — Apply Copilot to CI/CD, Actions, and infrastructure