September Gitpod Release 2022

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September 30, 2022

September Gitpod Release 2022

Welcome to the September edition of the Gitpod Changelog!

Key highlights

JetBrains Backend Control Center - Gitpod workspace actions
JetBrains Backend Control Center - Workspace Classes
JetBrains Reconnect With Open Windows
New Ports View in VS Code
SSH Gateway default for Self-Hosted VS Code Desktop Users
Configurable core dump behavior
Faster startup times for large repositories
Fixes and improvements

JetBrains Backend Control Center - Gitpod workspace actions

Caption: The Backend Control Center in JetBrains showing various Gitpod workspace actions

If you’re a Gitpod VS Code user, you know that in the command palette you can do things like:

Stop your workspace
Open the Gitpod dashboard
Open in VS Code Desktop

…and much more.

However, for JetBrains users, there was no way to access these common Gitpod commands without leaving the workspace. Or worse, opening your workspace using VS Code, rather than your preferred JetBrains IDE. It’s important that all the Gitpod editors and IDEs have a first-class experience for our users, no matter their preference, and our Jetbrains IDEs are no exception.

But now, we’ve added all of the Gitpod workspace actions you could do in VS Code into JetBrains.

You can now access these commands through:

The Backend Control Center in JetBrains
Or via the JetBrains IDE search menu

That means from within a JetBrains IDE you can directly:

All from the comfort of your IDE.

JetBrains Backend Control Center - Workspace Classes

Caption: The Backend Control Center in JetBrains showing workspace class information (e.g. 6 vCPU, 12GB memory)

Did you know that when you’re working with JetBrains IDEs in Gitpod you can monitor the performance of your workspace in real-time via the JetBrains Backend Control Center? This feature is useful when your workspace isn’t performing as you’d expect and you want to gather more information. In addition to our recent additions of Workspace CPU and Workspace Memory we’ve now added the actual workspace class to the information shown in the control center.

… but why? When you work in a cloud developer environment, you should have the flexibility to choose the right performance profile for your project. Recently we’ve been working to bring to Gitpod a feature we call “Workspaces Classes” #8261. With Workspaces Classes you’ll be able to select workspace specifications that better match your use case. For example, you will be able to get more powerful workspaces to run larger Java projects and IntelliJ.

So since we needed somewhere to show you this Workspace Class information, you can now find it in the JetBrains performance center.

Tip: You can run gp top to see performance info no matter the IDE or editor you’re using.

JetBrains Reconnect With Open Windows

JetBrains Reconnect

Previously, with JetBrains if you tried to open your workspace twice, the Gitpod JetBrains Gateway plugin would allow you, sometimes leading to odd behaviors or bugs, since JetBrains Gateway is designed to only allow one window to open. Now, when you try to open an already opened window with JetBrains Gateway, you’ll get a prompt to remind you that the workspace is already opened.

New Ports View in VS Code

Caption: The new VS Code Browser ports view, shown at the bottom of VS Code alongside the terminals and output tabs

You might have seen in our last changelog that we mentioned a new ports view being added to VS Code (in the browser). At that time we were rolling out the feature to only subsets of our Gitpod users to see how users responded. However, after some good feedback from you (our users) we have pushed the feature out to all users! 🥳

We introduced the new ports view as we wanted to align our experiences on VS Code Desktop with VS Code Browser. We know lots of users like to use Gitpod in the browser sometimes for “smaller changes” like reviewing pull requests. But for more “deep work” many users opt for VS Code Desktop. However and wherever you choose to code, Gitpod will make that as much a comfortable and familiar experience as you’re used to.

SSH Gateway default for Self-Hosted VS Code Desktop Users

We have previously shared about how we updated the underlying connection method of VS Code Desktop to Gitpod for our new SSH Gateway approach. The feature was first released defaulted off for all users. We have since enabled this SSH access method for all users of gitpod.io, and now we’ve enabled the approach for all VS Code Desktop users of Gitpod everywhere, no matter which installation they’re using.

Configurable core dump behavior

Debugging applications in Gitpod that are written with C++, Rust, or Python just got easier.

We’ve added a new coreDump configuration property to the .gitpod.yml file, allowing you to configure your workspace core dump behavior. You can enable/disable core dumps, or set soft and hard limits for them. For information on how to configure this property, check out the core dump property of the .gitpod.yml

Faster startup times for large repositories

Are you working with a large git repository? You want to hear about this.

We have changed how files are fetched from git into Gitpod on workspace start, to make your experience faster. In our testing of the changes, we observed differences from around 2m30s down to 40s. If you’re using large repositories with Gitpod, give it a try and let us know about your experience 🚀

Fixes and improvements

#13318 - Keep the last selected team selected
#13402 - [server] Fix for the inability to delete teams that were not subscribed to usage based pricing
#13438 - Fix missing port in parsed clone URL.
#13205 - JetBrains: VM options to install plugins
#12445 - Support for storing VS Code edit sessions in sync server
#13295 - Avoid second prebuild been triggered on same commit.
#13296 - Fail prebuild if image build fails.
#13186 - Restrict reuse of phone numbers for verification
#13203 - [server]: Add a liveness probe which fails when the nodejs event loop lag exceeds a certain threshold
#13080 - JetBrains Gateway: Avoid 30 seconds delay when connecting to a workspace using an expired token
#13161 - Admin dashboard now has pagination
#13108 - Fix reading .gitpod.yml for self-managed GHE instances.
#13065 - Added a usage view that displays past workspace sessions on individual and team accounts.
#13084 - Update GoLand IDE image to version 222.4167.25.
#13057 - improved automated code configuration service for go
#13001 - Update GitLab API library, which fixes paginated API requests.
#13033 - Update PhpStorm IDE image to version 222.4167.33.
#13032 - Update PyCharm IDE image to version 222.4167.33.
#12670 - Dismiss Usage Limit notifications automatically.
#12994 - Update IntelliJ IDEA IDE image to version 222.4167.29.
#12412 - Add beta notice and label on usage
#12852 - Add link to support on phone verification
#12833 - Improve fetching repositories loading state
#12771 - Show personal Usage page.
#12621 - JetBrains IDEs now have actions related to Gitpod, which can be accessed via Control Center and via the Search Menu.
#12669 - Reword “Spending Limit” to “Usage Limit”
#12568 - JetBrains: Provide workspace class info in Backend Control Center
#12232 - Fixed JetBrains connection loop when connecting twice to the same workspace