GateKeeper — Remote Command Approval
Approve VS Code Copilot (and Claude Code) terminal commands from your phone. 📱✅
Telegram is available today; Slack, WhatsApp, Discord, Email, SMS and more are coming soon.
Features
- One-click setup — paste your bot token + chat ID, click Start.
- Local-first approval — a VS Code notification appears first; it escalates to Telegram only if you don't respond.
- Approve from anywhere — VS Code or phone; first response wins.
- Interactive Q&A — Copilot can ask you questions and get an answer from either channel.
- Auto-approve safe commands — define regex patterns for commands that never need approval.
Quick Start (2 minutes)
1. Create a Telegram bot — open @BotFather, send /newbot, and copy the bot token.
2. Get your chat ID — start a chat with your new bot and send /start; copy the Chat ID from the reply.
3. Configure the extension — click the GateKeeper sidebar icon (or run GateKeeper: Setup), paste the token and chat ID, and click 🚀 Start Approval Server.
That's it — the extension starts the server, registers its Copilot MCP tool, and (if you use Claude Code) installs the approval hook for you. No manual config files to edit.
How It Works
- Copilot wants to run a command.
- A VS Code notification appears immediately with ✅ Approve / ❌ Reject.
- If you don't respond within
localApprovalDelay seconds (default 10), it escalates to Telegram.
- Either channel can approve — first response wins. No response within 5 minutes → auto-reject.
Copilot can also ask questions (ask_user) and get the options as buttons in VS Code or Telegram.
Make Copilot Use GateKeeper
By default Copilot uses its built-in terminal tool. To route commands through GateKeeper, tell Copilot to use mcp_gatekeeper_run_approved_command:
- Per project — create
.github/copilot-instructions.md:
## Terminal Commands
Always use `mcp_gatekeeper_run_approved_command` for all shell commands.
- All workspaces — add to
settings.json:
"github.copilot.chat.codeGeneration.instructions": [
{ "text": "Always use `mcp_gatekeeper_run_approved_command` for terminal commands instead of `run_in_terminal`." }
]
The tool degrades gracefully: server running → approval flow; server off → runs the command directly. So it's always safe to leave configured.
Reference
Extension commands — GateKeeper: Setup (main UI), Configure, Test Connection, Run Command with Approval, Manage Auto-Approve Patterns, Show Logs.
Telegram commands — /start, /status, /approveall, /rejectall.
Key settings
| Setting |
Description |
Default |
gatekeeper.serverUrl |
Server HTTP URL |
http://localhost:8765 |
gatekeeper.timeoutSeconds |
Total approval timeout |
300 |
gatekeeper.localApprovalDelay |
Seconds to wait for VS Code before Telegram |
10 |
gatekeeper.autoApprovePatterns |
Regex patterns to auto-approve |
[] |
"gatekeeper.autoApprovePatterns": ["^ls\\b", "^git status\\b", "^pwd$"]
Status bar — 🟢 running · 🟡 configured (click to start) · ⚪ not configured · (N pending).
Requirements
- Python 3.10+ on your
PATH (download).
- The extension bundles the bot and auto-installs its Python dependencies (
python-telegram-bot, aiohttp, mcp) the first time you click Start.
Security
- HTTP server binds to localhost only; the bot accepts commands only from your Chat ID.
- Bot token is kept in VS Code's secret storage. Commands auto-reject after 5 minutes.
Troubleshooting
- Server won't start? Open
GateKeeper: Show Logs; verify python3 --version is 3.10+ (brew install python@3.12 on macOS, or grab it from python.org).
- No Telegram messages? Double-check your Chat ID and token, and that you've sent
/start to the bot.
Links
Documentation · Report an issue · MIT License
