Category: Tips & Tricks

Getting started with Azure Devops MCP in VS Code

What is MCP? It stands for Model Context Protocol and enables your AI Agent (Such as Github Copilot in VS Code) to integrate directly against other systems. One such system is Azure Devops. This tools enables Copilot to read most of your organisation Azure Devops information.

So instead of context switching and copy pasting info from Devops (error messages or User Stories information etc) you can just ask your AI agent directly in your IDE.

Examples of useful prompts for a developer: (from ChatGPT)

Pipeline & Run Inspection

“Find my latest failed run for pipeline Backend-CI and summarize which step failed, including the log excerpt around the error.”

“Get the duration trend for the last 20 runs of ClientSPA-CI and highlight the slowest job.”

“List all pipelines that have not run in the last 60 days.”

“Compare two pipeline runs (Run 1412 and Run 1477) for MyApplication-API and explain the differences in steps, duration, and triggered changes.”

Pull Requests & Repo Info

“Show me all active PRs in the repo MyApplication that have unresolved comments.”

“Which PRs were merged this week, and which work items did they close?”

“Summarize the diff for PR 84303, but only include changes in the Angular project under ClientSPA/.”

“List files in the repo MyApplication that changed in the last 48 hours.”

“Search all repositories for references to ProductRowID.”

Work Items

“Find all work items assigned to me that are blocked by another work item, and summarize the blockers.”

“Show me work items marked as ‘Ready for test’ but not linked to any build or PR.”

“List all bugs created in the last 7 days containing the word paracetamol.”

Artifacts & Variables

“Show me all variable groups used by Backend-CI.”

“Fetch the artifacts for pipeline run 292 of ClientSPA-CI, list their sizes, and highlight anything over 100 MB.”

“Find pipelines that reference the variable AzureAd:ClientSecret.”

 

Setup in VS Code:
azure-devops-mcp/docs/GETTINGSTARTED.md at main · microsoft/azure-devops-mcp

General installation guide:
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/devops/mcp-server/mcp-server-overview?view=azure-devops#install-mcp-server

 

Enable or Disable Notification Center in Windows 11 | NinjaOne

The notification center in Windows 11 is a handy panel for your calendar, quick settings, and pop-up alerts, allowing you to stay informed. Despite its benefits when enabled, it can be distracting and give out too much information.Some users and organizations disable notification center to prevent distractions, ensure important alerts aren’t accidentally dismissed, and maintain a secure interface. In this guide, we will provide approaches using Group Policy, Registry Editor, and PowerShell to modify your

Source: Enable or Disable Notification Center in Windows 11 | NinjaOne

How I conquered multithreading and boosted my code’s speed

I finally understood multithreading — and now my code runs 10x faster. Multithreading used to sound like magic. Or worse — a trap full of race conditions, deadlocks, and endless debugging. But once I broke it down, I realized: It’s just parallel thinking with safety checks. Here’s what helped it all click:
🔹 Threads = multiple tasks running in parallel
🔹 Mutex/locks = only one thread can access shared data at a time
🔹 Race Conditions = when threads clash over shared state
🔹 Deadlocks = when threads wait

Source: How I conquered multithreading and boosted my code’s speed | Ankit Sharma posted on the topic | LinkedIn

Testing Components with children – Testing Angular

Testing Components with children

  • Rendering a Component with or without its children
  • Checking that the parent and its children are wired up correctly
  • Replacing child Components with fakes
  • Using the ng-mocks library to fake dependencies

Source: Testing Components with children – Testing Angular

Angular automated migration from ngIf and ngFor directives markup to control blocks

Directives such as *ngIf and *ngFor will soon get deprecated to favor the new control flow blocks.

E.g. old directives:

<ng-container *ngIf="isLoggedIn">...</ng-container>

Can now be replaced with the new syntax:

@if (isLoggedIn) {
   ...
}

An automated migration CLI command is available

Host and deploy Angular web app using Azure and Github

I am using Angular v17 and node v18.
In simple steps;
Goto azure portal.
Create a new resource of type “Static Web App”
I choose Github as Deployment source.

Regarding Angular v17, I had problems with the github deployment build actions:

  • Node was configured as v16 but angular v17 needs node v18
  • path to index.html for dist build could not be found

After Azure has created the static web app for Github deployment the following file is pushed into the repo:

.github/workflow/azure-static-web-apps-[*].yml

I hade to set the following values correctly:

app_location: "./" # App source code path
output_location: "./dist/gps-tracker/browser" # Built app content directory - optional

The output location should point to where the index.html file is located.
You should change the ‘gps-tracker’ to your application name. To find out exactly run ‘ng build’ locally and look into the created dist folder.

Regarding setting node version to 18: I added the following in the yml file:

env:
  NODE_VERSION: '18.x'

Print screen of node version setting: