⏱️ The Weekend Speedrun: Building the "Awesome Copilot Guide" with my AI Terminal Sidekick

This is a submission for the GitHub Copilot CLI Challenge

💡 What I Built

I built the Awesome Copilot Guide, an AI assistant that helps developers navigate the massive Awesome GitHub Copilot ecosystem. Think of it as your personal guide through hundreds of agents, skills, and prompts, so you don't have to scroll endlessly trying to find what you need.

Here's the thing: I had only 3 days to build this from scratch for the Algolia Agent Studio Challenge. Started coding on February 6th, deadline was February 8th at 23:59 PT. When you're working under that kind of pressure, having a solid programming buddy is everything.

Tech Stack:

• Next.js 16 with TypeScript
• Tailwind CSS and Shadcn UI
• Algolia Agent Studio powered by Google Gemini

Instead of browsing through a giant markdown file, you just tell the chat what you're working on, and it finds the perfect Copilot resources for your specific needs.

🎬 Demo

Live Demo: https://mouadbourbian.github.io/Awesome-Copilot-Guide
GitHub Link: https://github.com/MouadBourbian/Awesome-Copilot-Guide

🤖 My Experience with GitHub Copilot CLI

Honestly? Game changer.

When you're facing a tight deadline for a project that doesn't yet exist, every minute counts. GitHub Copilot CLI didn't just save me time; it kept me in flow.

⚙️ The Setup That Saved Me

First thing I did was create a devcontainer.json with Node.js, TypeScript, and the GitHub CLI. This gave me an isolated environment where I could experiment freely without worrying about messing up my local setup:

{
  "name": "Node.js & TypeScript",
  "image": "mcr.microsoft.com/devcontainers/typescript-node:1-22-bookworm",
  "features": {
    "ghcr.io/devcontainers/features/github-cli:1": {}
  }
}

Starting fresh — Copilot CLI ready to initialize the project

🤯 What Surprised Me

Copilot CLI asking thoughtful questions instead of blindly following commands

One command, and it sets up the entire Next.js project with best practices

It doesn't just blindly execute. When I asked it to initialize the project with Next.js and Vite, it actually stopped and questioned me. It caught that something was off — Next.js has its own build system (Turbopack/Webpack), so using it with Vite doesn't make sense. Instead of just running a broken command, it asked me to clarify what I really wanted. That kind of critical thinking? That's exactly what you want from a pair programmer.

Setting up CI/CD workflows — Copilot knows exactly what's needed

Summary of everything created — dependencies, config, the works

The summaries are clutch. After completing a task, it always gave me a quick rundown. I never had to wonder what just happened.

🔄 The Git Workflow That Actually Works

Here's my favorite part: when I finished a feature, I could tell Copilot CLI to:

"@.github/instructions/commit-conventions.instructions.md First, check the files to be staged in Git. Then view their diff. After that, add them step by step and commit them based on the changes, following the conventional commit process outlined in the instructions. Depending on what makes sense, a commit can either contain a single file or multiple files. Finally, push the changes to the remote repository."

The best part: it handles Git commits with logical groupings and proper messages

You can also review the commit message before it's committed.

Below is an overview of the process:

1. Review what changed
2. Group files logically (dependencies separate from config, features separate from docs)
3. Write meaningful commit messages that follow conventions
4. Push everything

And because I had custom commit guidelines in my project, it followed those too.

🌍 Real-World Impact

The deadline was Sunday at midnight (PT). By the end, I had:

• A working Next.js app with TypeScript
• Tailwind and Shadcn UI fully configured
• Algolia integration and Agent Studio setup
• GitHub Actions for CI/CD
• Comprehensive documentation

All because I spent more time thinking about what to build than how to build it.

🧰 What I Used It For

• Project initialization
• Debugging
• Workflow setup
• Documentation
• Git management

I used Claude Sonnet 4.5 as the model, which gave me solid reasoning and thoughtful suggestions throughout.

✨ The Bottom Line

Building under pressure is stressful. Having an AI sidekick that can handle the tedious setup, catch mistakes, and keep everything organized? That's what let me focus on solving the actual problem instead of fighting with configuration files.

If you're on the fence about trying GitHub Copilot CLI, here's my advice: just start with gh copilot on your next project. Ask it to help with one small thing. You'll see what I mean.