When commenting on Copilot-assigned PRs, the timeline refresh now uses exponential backoff with early exit detection to show newly launched Copilot sessions more responsively.

Problem

Previously, when a user commented on a Copilot-assigned PR, the extension would wait a fixed 1 second before refreshing the timeline to show the newly launched Copilot session. This caused delays since it takes time to determine and launch the session on GitHub.com.

Solution

Implemented exponential backoff with retry intervals of 500ms, 1s, 2s, and 5s that:

• Captures initial timeline state before starting retries
• Polls for new CopilotStarted events on each retry
• Exits early when a new Copilot session is detected
• Gracefully handles errors during timeline fetching
• Falls back to single refresh if no new events are found

Key Benefits

• Faster response when Copilot sessions start quickly (500ms vs 1s minimum)
• Better user experience by showing sessions immediately when available
• Server-friendly with reasonable retry intervals that avoid excessive load
• Maintains reliability with fallback behavior
• Backwards compatible with existing functionality

Implementation Details

The tryScheduleCopilotRefresh method in src/github/issueOverview.ts now:

// Before: Fixed 1-second wait
await new Promise(resolve => setTimeout(resolve, 1000));
if (!this._isDisposed) {
    this.refreshPanel();
}

// After: Exponential backoff with early exit
const delays = [500, 1000, 2000, 5000];
for (const delay of delays) {
    await new Promise(resolve => setTimeout(resolve, delay));
    
    const currentTimeline = await this._getTimeline();
    const currentCopilotStartedEvents = currentTimeline.filter(event => 
        event.event === EventType.CopilotStarted);
    
    if (currentCopilotStartedEvents.length > initialCopilotStartedEvents.length) {
        this.refreshPanel();
        return; // Early exit when new event found
    }
}

Testing

• Added comprehensive unit tests covering edge cases
• Verified exponential backoff timing and early exit logic
• Confirmed backwards compatibility with existing behavior
• All existing tests continue to pass

Fixes #7231.

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