Sure, AI tools can do this. However, VS Code is the platform. Why aren't more people worried about running arbitrary VS Code extension that can do the same thing, AI or not?
As an VSCode extension author, I am always terrified by the amount of power I have.
It is a shame that the team never prioritized extension permission issues [0] despite their big boss said security is the top priority [1]. All they have is "workspace trust" and various other marginally useful security measures.
I don't install a VSCode extension unless it is either official or well known and audited and I have to use it. I keep most of them disabled by default unless I need something for a project. (Even if you don't care about security, it's good for VSCode performance. I'll save that story for another day.)
[0] https://github.com/microsoft/vscode/issues/52116
[1] https://blogs.microsoft.com/blog/2024/05/03/prioritizing-sec...
When some minor extension that I have installed on VSCode updates (like parens colorizing and the like) I think what could happend if the author sells it to some bad actor (or decides to push some weird code in an update).
So I started uninstalling some icon themes and less used extensions that I installed on a whim years ago.
I implicitly trust extensions by Google, Microsoft and the like, but the less known published make me nervous.
It doesn't even have to be malicious. I used a certain syntax highlighting theme for years, when out of nowhere the author pushed an update that rearranged all the colors. It was extremely disorienting. I forked the extension and reverted the change, so I know that one at least won't change out from under me anymore.
This is the thing I hate the most about "automatic updates" in general. I've disabled them and gone back to updating manually because the constant unexpected and unwanted UI changes finally broke a part of my soul. Unfortunately that is something that can't be done on the web, where major UI changes can be rolled out right in the middle of a session on you.
> As an VSCode extension author, I am always terrified by the amount of power I have.
Meanwhile random FOSS projects be like "please sudo curl bash to install the prebuilt binaries".
Most don't even use functions when writing those scripts and it can straight up fuck your system on accident. It's very unlikely but it can happen and a malicious actor can trigger it on purpose.
But this is true about lots of code. We have this notion of "it works, therefore there's no problem" which is just bad engineering. Just because you don't know there's a problem doesn't mean there isn't. Just because it passes the tests doesn't mean you have test coverage.
How did that even get started? It’s not like downloading a zip or tar file is so terribly taxing.
Convenience, mostly.
curl -L "foo.sh" -o foo.sh && bash foo.sh
Why sudo though?
I honestly think it's stupidity. Most people really don't know you can build programs to the user and don't need system privileges. I think everyone is just so used to installing from package managers and doing `sudo make install` that they forgot programs only need to be in $PATH and not /usr/bin
How is that any safer?
First off, I never used sudo...
Second off, you're not steaming into bash
Third, you gotta read between the lines a little. I used some convenience considering my audience is programmers. Don't use && or shove && `less foo.sh` in the middle. There's a million options here
Don't take the example overly literally. Saving to file means you can read it before executing it.
That aside, it protects you from this gaping hole of an exploit mechanism. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17636792
This is one of my pet peeves! No one should normalize the idea of piping curl output to bash.
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I agree. Sadly most of us aren't going to build from source, and some tools don't really work without sudo. (Did I mention VSCode? On Linux you get a .deb file. Yeah.)
In practice, building from source is not going to fix the problem. Nobody reads the source code of projects they download and compile themselves, certainly not for larger projects. It also takes a long time to compile larger projects. So, realistically, these rarely happen.
Of course, the one advantage of having source is that it is easier to run things like SAST tools against source, but how many people do that in practice? How integrated is that with package systems? And when package maintainers might provide hashes of what they ostensibly checked, you still need trust.
So we need a combination of static analysis tools that are integrated properly to produce trusted binaries, and you need earned trust and authority. Hyperindividualist self-reliance is, at the very minimum, impractical. And with authority, we know whose job it is to care for the quality of software and therefore whom to hang.
> building from source is not going to fix the problem. Nobody reads the source code of projects they download and compile themselves
However commits tend to be much easier to trace at a later date than arbitrary binaries so attackers will be less inclined to go that route. Once committed it's there forever unless you can somehow get everyone to censor it from their own copies for an unrelated reason. Consider that the xz compromise involved downloading the payload later.
My policy is to either obtain binaries from a major distro or to build from a clean commit in a network isolated environment. If I can't go one of those routes it's almost always a hard pass for me.
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The situation is absolutely insane, but it's also productive, but real security would slow everything down a lot. The moment you ask some corporate bureaucrat to put their signature down on a piece of paper saying that such and such dev tool is approved for use, they're going to block everything to avoid the responsibility implied by their approval. I can't really come up with a system that both works and is secure. The only exception is signing up for an integrated environment where Microsoft or Apple provides the OS, compiler, and editor. Oops - Apple doesn't sell servers, so only Microsoft offers this. Hope you like C#.
In theory you can mix and match, but in practice most bureaucrats will insist on single-sourcing.
Linux development has a blueprint they could follow. Like the principle of least privilege. These aren’t cutting edge concepts.
Also I’m not sure the tradeoffs of adding security to an editor are that big of a deal. Are we really seeing revolutionary stuff here? Every now and then I check out VS Code only to realize Vim is still 10x better.
Vim is hardly secure either. Extensions in both provide for arbitrary code execution.
At the company I work for they locked down installing extensions through the marketplace. Some are available but most are not and there is a process to get them reviews and approved. You might be able to side load them still but I haven’t cared enough to want to try.
They did the same with Chrome extensions.
Same thing for browser extensions: a simple browser extension (e.g. web dark mode), can read all your password fields. It's crazy that there are no proper permission scopes in any major browsers ! It would have been so easy to make password / email fields exempt from browser extensions unless they ask for the permission.
I do not think it'd be "so easy" to separate password input access into a separate permission because it'd only open up a can of worms. There's so many ways to read a password input's value, from listening to key events to monkey patching `fetch`, that it's not worth playing whack-a-mole just to provide users a false sense of security
I'm also skeptical that even a dark mode extension would be simple considering how varied web pages can be
Pro tip: I’ve seen plenty of dedicated extensions that could have just been simple snippet equivalents in Tampermonkey - an extension that lets you run JS limited to wildcarded websites.
I've used it to inject download links on sites, autoclose modals, etc. You can either write them yourself, or review other people before installing them.
It’s not a perfect solution, but at least it reduces the surface area to a single extension.
FYI: Just set Script Updates to Never.
In your example wouldn't that leave the email and password fields the wrong color? I agree with the principle though. Most extensions don't need to access everything.
Installing any 3rd party dev dependency without sandboxing should terrify you. These supply chain attacks are not hypothetical.
Trusting other devs to not write malicious code has led to a surprisingly small number of incidents so far, but I don't think this will extrapolate into the future.
With more lines of code being auto-written without deliberate intent or review from an accountable author, things can only get worse!
Yes, exactly. The lack of any sort of permission controls for extensions in VS Code gives me the creeps
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I am (am worried) and recently stopped adding extensions by just the random anon. Also I take time to sanitise foreign (to my knowledge) gh repos using Claude code.
As an aside, claude and codex (and probably gemini) are pretty good at doing that. I've now done it with several repos and they are pretty good at finding stuff. In one case codex found an obscure way to reach around the authentication in one of our services. This is a great use case for LLMs IMHO
They are (of course) not foolproof and very well may miss something, so people need to evaluate their own risk/reward tradeoff with these extensions, even after reviewing them with AI, but I think they are pretty useful.
I don't really get how VSCode got so popular. You can use a language server perfectly easily with Vim, Emacs, Helix, Sublime, etc. You can customize basically everything in those editors, syntax, etc. You can just alias console commands for all of your build tools with some custom scripts if you need more complex build commands routinely. The git terminal tool works better than any VScode option. And VSCode is slower than all of those.
We already have so many good fast secure polygot customizable text editors. Why run one through Chrome and fill it with extensions for everything that will have arbitrary access to everything?
> I don't really get how VSCode got so popular. You can use a language server perfectly easily with Vim, Emacs, Helix, Sublime, etc.
You open it. It just works. And the learning curve is smooth.
Compare this to Vim where, if it's the first time you're opening it, you are forced to kill the process because you don't even know how to quit it, never mind actually do any productive work.
> Compare this to Vim where, if it's the first time you're opening it, you are forced to kill the process because
I'm serious. Open a blank file by typing `vim` into the terminal. Don't press anything, just look at the screen.
I'm sorry, but reading docs, or just reading, shouldn't be considered a significant barrier to entry.
> Compare this to Vim where, if it's the first time you're opening it,
If you open vim with a file, like you do with all file editors, there's no such examples. It's also at the bottom of auth/credit/contribution fluff in your example, which people would be expected to ignore.
> Because you can't read
I'm not arguing for more hand holding here, but saying the poster can't read is ironic. Reading is one part, comprehending is the other.
> If you open vim with a file, like you do with all file editors, there's no such examples
Besides, your first usage of VSCode isn't going to be opening a file. It also gives you info at the startup.
Are you seriously telling me you haven't Googled how to use VSCode? Or did you just forget because you are now comfortable using it and used to it?
> not sure why we're pretending vim is easy to use
The conversation is no different than iPhone users fumbling their first time on Android and Android users fumbling their first time on iPhones. If you didn't have to learn things then this would never happen. Can there be better communication around vim? Certainly, that's always going to be true. But "run `vimtutor`" is pretty effective and I'm sorry, DEVELOPERS shouldn't be documentation adverse.
If you want to use vim you only need to know a few things. `i` to start typing (insert), esc (or ctrl+[) to go to "command mode", `:w` to write, `:q` to quit. That's literally 4 things. In the standard vim config you can use your mouse and arrow keys, so you don't even need to learn hjkl to get going.
Truthfully, the main difference is where the learning happens. vim forces the user to learn a few things up front (and not many). Getting all my python envs and configuring everything in VSCode took me much longer than the 15-20 minutes it takes to read vimtutor. You get your "Hello World" out faster, but it also makes dealing with environments and other things harder.
What I will admit is that vim is hard to master.
But mastery is very different than usage. Even intermediate level is not hard to achieve once you understand the design language. It's a different way of thinking but come one, it's aimed at programmers. You're really telling me it is hard to learn that there's a command mode and a writing mode? That commands are composed of actions + motions? Going through vimtutor means you should know a lot more commands than vimtutor introduces because of this design language. But mastery? It requires reading docs and years. But that's not a flaw because what you can do in vim is nearly unbounded. While that's also kinda true about VSCode there is a much steeper learning curve you need to do fancy things and that knowledge isn't going to make you really better at general VSCode usage.
> It's a meme
People brag about how dumb they are all the time. I don't get how you think that's a defense. There's plenty of docs in the program itself and plenty more online. Many being well written. But ultimately vim isn't being targeted at the general audience (unlike Ikea furniture) and it's perfectly acceptable that it requires a little reading. By my screen you get all the commands I listed, and more, with two screens worth of text from vimturor. 1 screen if you split, since it is 80 chars width. That really isn't much reading. If that is the definition of "hard", for developers, then I have no hope for software. It shouldn't be "hard" or "too much" for anyone. Let's be honest. Are you really okay with the bar being so low that it's impossible for a blind person to trip over?
> It's also at the bottom of auth/credit/contribution fluff in your example
VIM - Vi IMproved
version 9.1.857
by Bram Moolenaar et al.
Vim is open source and freely distributable
Become a registered Vim user!
type :help register<Enter> for information
type :q<Enter> to exit
type :help<Enter> or <F1> for on-line help
type :help version9<Enter> for version info
If you brag about being lazy, expect to be called lazy.
> Because you can't read
A lot of people can't, that is why vscode is so popular
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How long have you been developing code for others to use?
Rule number one is that users don't read documentation.
Who are you making software for? That matters.
General public? Yeah, assume idiotic.
Developers? If you can't read docs then you can't do your job.
I don't have much confidence in LLMs replacing devs, but if the dev is so arrogant that they think they're too good for documentation and if they have to read is too complicated, then yeah I believe AI can already replace that person. They were just a warm body, not a dev.
You're not going to be making successful customer-facing software with that attitude.
This isn't the flex you think it is. You're really illustrating my point... being able to understand context and make inferences is part of basic literacy skills
I'm sure you're being sincere here but this really reads like that famous HN comment about "who needs Dropbox when ftp exists". The reason vscode is popular is not because it does something impossible to do otherwise, but because it does those things out of the box with a friendly UI.
But we are programmers. I think there is a difference between expect John Accountant who doesn't trust his computer to set up RSync and a server, and a Programmer who is already going to spend a good chunk of their day in a terminal windiow anyways.
Dude I'm tired. Tired of having to learn some stupid new UI paradigm just because.
I really really wish there was ONE standard orthodoxy with regards to UI and how programs work and how we get around them.
Instead we have these clowns constantly inventing new ones. I love learning things and tweaking things but I have limited bandwidth and I am so over micromanaging my PC
For the record I know and love vi. But as I get older I find myself yearning more for the cathedral than the bazaar
I think you missed the issue with the Dropbox comment. Look back at it. He talks about using Linux, FTP, curlftps, SVN, and doing a network mount.
The comment isn't actually even talking about providing the same service, so they mention emailing themselves files and usb drives.
The problem was there was a big technical hurdle to locally network mount a file system. Especially across OSes. It's even harder to do it non locally. Sure, it's not hard if you're familiar with that stuff. Sure, it's not hard to learn if you're comfortable in the terminal. Sure, today you can use rclone. BUT that's not a tool my grandma can use.
On the other hand, we're not talking about tools my grandma can use. We're talking about tools a programmer can use.
> You can use a language server perfectly easily with Vim, Emacs, Helix, Sublime, etc.
By the way, the language server protocol was originally developed for VSCode [1]. The popularity of LSP in other editors might have contributed to advertise VSCode.
Mostly because installing and setting up VSCode takes one click
As opposed to 'sudo apt install vim'? or 'sudo dnf install vim'? Same for emacs. sublime you might need to add a package repository.
Or even, and I hate that I'm saying this, install vim from the apt store?
brew install emacs
I heard there’s an emacs macro for that.
Vs code was also arguably prettier than the rest in release
I decided to switch after notepad++ got hacked.
I used Sublime for years and VSCode is vastly better (the breaking straw was how they'd silo off critical bug fixes in new versions that were pay-only, upon finding vscode I felt silly for not switching sooner, it was so much easier to use and more powerful). Still use vim daily but not as a general IDE, memorizing decades of weird character commands and directives is not a great use of my time.
my favorite VSCode feature is the SSH remote working feature. VSCode gives me the full editing / console / Claude environment on my local workstation, where all files, shells, and yes Claude as well run on a company lab machine over the VPN. Props to the collaborative working feature where several people can all share the same VSCode editor session on their individual workstations.
Vim can do the above two things if you run as a terminal app with tmux. Sublime could do it if you shared the editor via X or Waypipe (well not the second feature). But VSCode integrates it directly in the app and it's a much better experience.
> But VSCode integrates it directly in the app and it's a much better experience.
well it's my lab machine and all 192G + 24 cores are mine all mine, problem solved
It's hard for me to fathom that there are capable devs who would pollute their ide with this crap in the first place, malicious or not
> We install them without a second thought. They're in the official marketplace. They have thousands of reviews. They work. So we grant them access to our workspaces, our files, our keystrokes - and assume they're only using that access to help us code.
Who is this “we”? I don’t, and don’t know anybody else who does this.
Also, was this article itself written by an AI assistant? If the author is that carefree regarding these extensions, I guess probably.
Between this and the notepad++ thing... I got to start running programmes with firejail or something.
This seems expected, when you install free, random software, especially from sources known for surveillance/malware/crime.
I'm honestly surprised this issue in general didn't cause nearly every company to immediately ban all AI.
Why do these companies put so much effort into fighting right to repair to avoid IP leaks any halfway serious company could reverse engineer in a week, but on the other hand encourage their employees to vibe all company secrets into the cloud?
It's a bit trite, but the answers are: 1) money 2) money
Can't repair your own stuff and either need to use authorized repair shop or buy new? The company gets more money.
Force your developers to forgo quality in efforts to produce more cruft in less time? The company gets more money.
Of course, only considering short-term, long-term they'll lose money, but at that point all the executives and managers already got their bonuses and probably moved on to doing the same in some other company.
> Why do these companies put so much effort into fighting right to repair to avoid IP leak
Only if you believe they are truthful about the reason for fighting right to repair. I think the reason for fighting right to repair is to reduce the time before a replacement purchase is required.
> but on the other hand encourage their employees to vibe all company secrets into the cloud?
Lots of companies do ban or restrict usage of LLMs etc.
Companies aren't interested in hypotheticals, nobody is paid to care, and most code isn't that valuable anyway.
Code isn't valuable? And here I thought software was a multi trillion dollar business
Features are valuable. Code is a liability.
Most large companies have their CI/CD behind a proxy with an allow list and require internal approval for tools and extensions. So there is that.
Uhh a lot of companies did and are strict on what AI tools are allowed.
The main thing I had to wait on for a long time was support for preventing 3rd party code from being plagiarized since our code base was intermingled with partnered companies.
Contracts.
> Not just what you're actively working on. Every file you glance at. Every character you type. Captured and transmitted.
Even this reads like an AI extension wrote it.
This is one of the many reasons why I don’t use VS Code, or use any “helpful” AI plugins (or any plugins really).
You all can take vim out of my cold dead hands.
What's stopping a vim plugin from doing similar data exfiltration? Tons of people blindly install LazyVim, Spacevim, or other vim tooling and choose a bunch of similar things.
In general? Nothing, really.
I think it’s the culture behind the (neo)vim community is a bit more technical, and are quite quicker to sound the alarm if anyone tries something shady.
But, in any event, I hand-roll my own config and every plugin I install is inspected by me. When I pull changes, I check the diffs for anything shady. If a plugin is simple enough, I will just integrate it into my own stuff.
Well, AI already sends your code to US so ...
Most AI only sends a limited context. These are sending all files it can access as well as all edits.
> These are sending all files it can access
TBF, Cursor's code indexing works the same way, it has to send all workspace files to their servers.
Auto-completion systems need previous edits to suggest next edits so no surprises their either.
Yes because there's no difference between a voluntary service with limited context needs and a malicious extension
Cursor is a malicious extension though, and nobody seems to care.
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“I donate money to animal shelters”
“Oh that’s cool, I already donate to my local neo nazi group. We are both philanthropists!”
Nothing makes me go from apolitical to a red blooded American faster than seeing someone make a stupid false equivalency about the US on this forum
It wasn't China that recently threatened with an invasion of Greenland (I'm Danish). That being said, it's not like you would want your data to go to either countries.
You did hear about Snowden and the massive NSA data collection ? That was almost 20 years ago, think about what it's like now: they probably use our data to run an elaborate simulation of everyone.
Shocking news: not everybody here is from the US.
In fact, many even are from "hostile countries" that are "enemies of democracy".
What's more, some of those people aren't aligned with US interests and aren't willing to put their lives on the line for CIA operations!
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