Auto Shutdown Chat — VS Code extension + Windows service

A safety-first VS Code chat participant that can trigger a clean Windows shutdown after a chat response finishes. It talks to a companion Windows service over a named pipe. Disabled by default and ships with dry-run on by default.

This repo contains two deliverables:

• VS Code extension “Auto Shutdown Chat” (TypeScript) that contributes a chat participant @auto-shutdown and a command to toggle the feature.
• Windows service (C#/.NET 8) that listens on a named pipe for PING, DRYRUN, and SHUTDOWN commands. Packaged via a WiX v4 MSI installer.

Note: This can power off your machine. Validate end-to-end with dry-run before enabling real shutdown.

✨ Features

• VS Code Chat participant: @auto-shutdown uses the Language Model API to answer, then optionally signals shutdown when streaming completes.
• Opt-in with guardrails: global enable/disable, dry-run mode, and confirmation dialog.
• Reliable IPC: newline-delimited request/response over Windows named pipes with timeout + small retry/backoff.
• Windows service executes a clean shutdown with SeShutdownPrivilege and logs to console and Windows Event Log (when available).

🧱 Architecture

• Extension (client) → Windows named pipe server (service). Default pipe: \\.\pipe\AutoShutdownService.
• Commands supported by the service:
  • PING → PONG
  • DRYRUN → OK dryrun (if enabled)
  • SHUTDOWN → ACK shutdown and then initiates system shutdown

Service settings are in windows-service/src/AutoShutdownService/appsettings.json and can be overridden via environment variables (see Configuration).

📦 Prerequisites

• Windows 10/11
• Node.js 20+
• .NET SDK 8.0+
• WiX Toolset v4 (to build the MSI)

🚀 Install and quick start

You can validate IPC locally without installing the service as a Windows Service.

1. Build the service (Debug) and run it as a console app

dotnet build windows-service/src/AutoShutdownService/AutoShutdownService.csproj -c Debug
& "windows-service/src/AutoShutdownService/bin/Debug/net8.0-windows/AutoShutdownService.exe"

2. Test the named pipe

node windows-service/tools/test-pipe.js PING
node windows-service/tools/test-pipe.js DRYRUN
# Expect: PONG, and OK dryrun

3. Build the extension and run tests

npm ci
npm test

🛠️ MSI install (service)

Build and install the Windows service via the WiX v4 MSI:

1. Build the MSI

dotnet build windows-service/installer/AutoShutdownService.Installer.wixproj -c Release

MSI output: windows-service/installer/bin/Release/AutoShutdownService.Installer.msi.

2. Install/start (requires elevated PowerShell)

msiexec /i "windows-service/installer/bin/Release/AutoShutdownService.Installer.msi" /qn
Get-Service AutoShutdownService

Service should report Status: Running.

3. Manage the service

Start-Service AutoShutdownService
Stop-Service AutoShutdownService
Get-Service AutoShutdownService

4. Uninstall

msiexec /x "windows-service/installer/bin/Release/AutoShutdownService.Installer.msi" /qn

If MSI uninstall fails, you can remove the service manually (Administrator):

sc.exe delete AutoShutdownService

⚙️ Configuration

Extension settings (User/Window scope)

• autoShutdown.enabled (boolean, default false): Enable shutdown signaling after the response finishes.
• autoShutdown.dryRun (boolean, default true): Send DRYRUN instead of SHUTDOWN.
• autoShutdown.confirmBeforeShutdown (boolean, default true): Ask for confirmation before signaling.
• autoShutdown.pipeName (string, default AutoShutdownService): Named pipe name (server listens on \\.\pipe\<name>).
• autoShutdown.timeoutMs (number, default 3000): IPC timeout.

Service settings (appsettings.json or ENV)

File: windows-service/src/AutoShutdownService/appsettings.json

{
  "Service": {
    "PipeName": "AutoShutdownService",
    "ReadTimeoutMs": 5000,
    "WriteTimeoutMs": 5000,
    "AllowDryRun": true
  }
}

Environment variable overrides use the AUTOSHUTDOWN_ prefix and __ for nesting, for example:

$env:AUTOSHUTDOWN_Service__PipeName = "AutoShutdownService"
$env:AUTOSHUTDOWN_Service__AllowDryRun = "true"

🧑‍💻 Usage

• Open the Chat view and type @auto-shutdown <your question>.
• The extension will stream the model response. After it completes, and if enabled, it will confirm and then contact the service.
• Start with dry-run enabled to verify connectivity (Service response: OK dryrun). When confident, turn dry-run off.

Command palette: “Auto Shutdown: Toggle Enabled”.

🧪 Development

• Compile extension: npm run compile
• Watch: npm run watch
• Package VSIX (optional): npm run package
• Tests (Mocha): npm test (compiles TS, builds .NET service, runs tests)

Notes for packaging/publishing with @vscode/vsce:

• Install the CLI: npm i -g @vscode/vsce (or use npx @vscode/vsce).
• Update publisher in package.json to your Marketplace publisher ID.
• vsce package creates a .vsix you can install locally.
• vsce publish requires a publisher and a Personal Access Token (see VS Code docs).

🔍 Troubleshooting

• Pipe not found (ENOENT): Ensure the service is running and the pipe name matches. Get-Service AutoShutdownService.
• Permission/ACL issues: When running the service console app for dev, use an elevated PowerShell so the secure pipe ACL can be created.
• Timeouts: Increase autoShutdown.timeoutMs in the extension or ReadTimeoutMs in the service if your environment is slow.
• Event Log: Event Viewer → Windows Logs → Application → Source: AutoShutdownService.
• File lock on rebuild: Get-Process AutoShutdownService -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue | Stop-Process -Force.

⚠️ Limitations and notes

• Windows only. Requires Administrator rights to install the service and to initiate shutdown.
• Not a web extension; requires Node.js net and local Windows named pipes.
• Chat requires a language model selectable in VS Code Chat. If no model is available, the extension reports this in chat.

📁 Project layout

src/                    # Extension sources (TypeScript)
windows-service/        # .NET 8 Windows service + WiX v4 installer
  src/AutoShutdownService/
  installer/
test/                   # Mocha tests (Node)

📜 License

No license file is currently included. Consider adding a LICENSE (for example, MIT or Apache-2.0) before publishing.

🙌 Acknowledgments

• Uses VS Code Chat Participant and Language Model APIs.
• WiX Toolset v4 for MSI packaging.