VS Orchestrator
See every open VS Code window, remember the repositories you use, and jump to the right workspace without hunting through the taskbar.
What it does
- Lists live VS Code windows in the Secondary Side Bar.
- Saves repositories as favourites, so a closed workspace is one click away.
- Focuses an already-open workspace or opens a saved one in a new window.
- Uses colour dots and optional matching title-bar colours to make windows easy to distinguish.
- Provides a dashboard editor tab for layouts where the side bar is unavailable.
- Exposes Copilot agent-mode tools to list, open, colour, and show workspaces.
Everything runs locally. The extension has no runtime dependencies and does not download anything.
Install
Install from VS Code Market place
Alternatively, run Developer: Install Extension from Location... from the Command Palette and select this folder. For development, open the project in VS Code and press F5 to start an Extension Development Host.
Use
- Select the VS Orchestrator icon in the Activity Bar.
- In Open Windows, select a workspace to focus it. Use the pin action to save it.
- In Saved Repos, select an open repo to focus it or a closed repo to open it in a new window.
- Use the colour action on any item to choose a palette or custom hex colour. Select Default to restore the normal title bar and white indicator dot.
Use VS Orchestrator: Open Orchestration Mode, its view-title button, or Ctrl+Alt+O to restore orchestration mode: Copilot Chat in Agent mode as an editor, the side bars in the current profile's preferred position, and optionally the integrated terminal in the bottom panel. The command is safe to repeat and falls back to normal Copilot Chat when the editor-based Chat command is unavailable.
With VS Code 1.95 or later and Copilot Chat available, agents can use:
| Reference |
Action |
#orchestratorList |
List open windows and saved repos. |
#orchestratorOpen |
Focus an existing workspace or open a saved one. |
#orchestratorColour |
Set a palette/custom colour or restore the default. |
#orchestratorPanel |
Reveal the VS Orchestrator panel/dashboard. |
Settings
| Setting |
Default |
Description |
vsOrchestrator.colorizeTitleBar |
true |
Apply the selected workspace colour to its title bar. |
vsOrchestrator.autoRevealOnFocus |
true |
Reveal VS Orchestrator after focusing or opening a workspace from the extension. |
vsOrchestrator.openInOrchestrationMode |
true |
Open every window in orchestration mode. When off, activate it with the button, command, or hotkey. Panel-opened windows always use orchestration mode. |
vsOrchestrator.openTerminalInOrchestrationMode |
true |
Open the integrated terminal panel when entering orchestration mode. Off leaves its current visibility unchanged. |
The settings button opens the extension's settings editor, which also provides Export and Import actions for saved repositories. Imports merge by normalized repository path and do not remove existing entries. Chat placement follows the active VS Code profile's workbench.sideBar.location setting.
How it works
VS Code does not provide an API for one extension instance to inspect every other window. VS Orchestrator solves this locally: each open window writes a small heartbeat record to VS Code's shared extension storage. Other windows read those records to build the panel, and stale records are cleaned up automatically.
Saved repos and colour choices are stored per user in VS Code extension storage. No administrator permissions, native modules, or external services are required.
Limitations
- Window discovery refreshes on a short heartbeat, so a closed window can appear for up to about 15 seconds.
- If the same folder is open in multiple windows, VS Code decides which matching window receives focus.
- Empty windows are listed but cannot be focused by folder path.
- Title-bar colours are written to workspace settings and depend on VS Code using a custom title bar. A repository that already has
.vscode/settings.json is left unchanged and its settings take precedence.
