DeepSeek Harness Chat for VS Code

Unofficial, community-built extension — not affiliated with or endorsed by DeepSeek.

Run a local DeepSeek Harness coding-agent runtime from the VS Code Activity Bar.

Features

• Stream durable Harness session events in a native VS Code view.
• Create and resume workspace-scoped sessions.
• Queue prompts or cancel a running turn.
• Attach the active file or current selection explicitly.
• Answer Harness approval and user-question requests.
• Keep API keys and filesystem authority out of the webview.

Setup

The extension connects to a DSH Web endpoint at deepseekHarness.web.url (default http://127.0.0.1:3080). If nothing is reachable there, it launches one automatically:

• deepseekHarness.autoStart (default true) enables auto-start.
• By default, the extension clones deepseek-harness into its own global storage on first use, runs pnpm install/pnpm run build there, then starts it with pnpm dsh web --no-open. First run takes a few minutes; later runs are fast (~10s).
• To use your own checkout instead, set deepseekHarness.runtime.cwd to its path (still runs via pnpm). To use a different command entirely, set deepseekHarness.runtime.command/runtime.args explicitly.

Requires git and pnpm on your PATH.

Configure the provider key (for example DEEPSEEK_API_KEY) in your shell environment or through your Harness deployment before starting VS Code.

Development

npm install
npm run typecheck
npm test
npm run build
npm run package

Press F5 in VS Code after adding a standard extension-host launch configuration, or install the generated .vsix.

Security

The webview cannot execute shell commands or access files. It sends validated actions to the extension host; DSH remains responsible for sandbox and approval policy. Context is only attached when requested, and file navigation is constrained to the open workspace.

Current scope

Desktop VS Code and local runtimes are supported. Remote extension hosts, browser-based VS Code, images, and full parity with the DSH Web GUI are not included in 0.0.1.

Credits

• Author: 1rsh
• Icon: Whale icons created by mnauliady - Flaticon.