CodeStream’s GitLab integration for VS Code, Visual Studio, Atom and all JetBrains IDEs is now publicly available. The integration, which works with both GitLab Cloud and GitLab Self-Managed, lets you create, review, and merge GitLab merge requests without ever leaving your IDE. All with full source-tree and full file access, your favorite keybindings, and all the code intelligence embedded in your development environment.
All of the MRs relevant to you are easily accessible in the four default sub-sections:
The default sections outlined above are just a starting point. You can delete any of them, or create your own by clicking on the funnel icon in the heading of this section and creating a custom query. For example, you might want to see all open MRs for a specific project. Click the gear icon if you’d like to see only MRs for repos you have open in your IDE.
You aren’t limited to just the MRs listed in the Merge Requests section. You can open any MR in CodeStream by grabbing the URL and pasting it into the “Load MR from URL” section.
Do you have repos on both GitLab and GitHub? Or maybe GitLab’s cloud service and GitLab Self-Managed? You can be connected to multiple code hosts at the same time, and access all of your MRs/PRs.
Click on any MR from the Merge Requests section view any MR, and you’ll be able to see the MR in its entirety, just as you would at gitlab.com. Click anywhere in the sidebar at the right to edit any aspect of the MR. Add assignees. Change labels. Add a to do.
Click on the Changes tab, just as you would at gitlab.com, to start reviewing the changes. You can view the changes in Diff Hunks view, similar to at gitlab.com, where you see just the code that changed. And you can comment by clicking on the + button that appears in the gutter.
Use List view to see all the files in the changeset in a single list.
Use Tree view to see all the files in the changeset organized by folder.
When in tree or list views, you’ll get a full-file side-by-side diff, and you can comment on the changes simply by selecting some code from the right side of the diff and then clicking on the comment button that appears to the left. Unlike at gitlab.com, you can even comment on lines of code outside of the changeset.
Right from CodeStream you can approve your merge request and merge it if you have appropriate permissions.
CodeStream gives MR comments a second life by displaying them alongside the blocks of code that they refer to, so that developers working on that code can reference the past discussions to give them insight into why the code looks the way it does.
To display MR comments, click on the gear menu in the heading of the Codemarks section of the CodeStream pane, and then select “Show icons in editor gutter” > “Pull Request comments”.
Access GitLab issues assigned to you in your IDE. If your team uses multiple issue trackers, like Jira, Trello, Linear, and 11 others, you can view those as well.
Click on an issue and if you haven’t started working on it yet you’ll be able to create a new feature branch and update your Slack status in one step. The name of the branch is based on a configurable template.
You can also create a GitLab issue, connected to a block of code, without leaving your IDE. Maybe you come across a bug in the code, or see some tech debt you want to flag. Just select some code and click the Bug icon.
When creating an issue from CodeStream highlighted code is included in the issue on gitlab.com. You, or other teammates can click on the “Open in IDE” link to open that file positioned accordingly in your IDE.
Please post any questions or general feedback to @teamcodestream on Twitter.
If you’re new to CodeStream select your IDE below to get started. If you need more information on how to register and create a team please see our Getting Started documentation. If you sign up via GitLab authentication you should see a Merge Requests section at the top of the CodeStream pane with a list of all of the MRs relevant to you.
Otherwise, you’ll see buttons for you to connect to GitLab or GitLab Self-Managed as appropriate.
If you were already on CodeStream, and connected to GitHub, you can also connect to GitLab by clicking on your headshot on the top of the CodeStream pane and then selecting “Integrations”.
