Investigate global policy support

[joaomoreno]

Enabling global policy support will help system admins to configure VS Code on their networks.

One idea is to allow VS Code settings to opt-in to become policies. If set, a setting's policy value will overwrite any setting source value, whether that's user, workspace, memory or remote.

In progress:

• Update ConfigurationRegistry to support settings opting in to becoming policies @joaomoreno
• Generate Windows Group Policy definition files from static analysis #148941
• Create PolicyService and use it in ConfigurationService #148943
• Surface policy values in settings editor #148944

Future:

• Support macOS Configuration Profiles as a policy backend #148942
• Support JSON file as a policy backend #148945

References:

• https://github.com/mozilla/policy-templates
• https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-versions/windows/desktop/policy/implementing-registry-based-policy
• https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/client-management/mdm/understanding-admx-backed-policies

cc @sana-ajani @sandy081

[sandy081]

Related: #27972

[ajkerzner]

I look forward to JSON-based policies, which would allow policy deployment in Linux.

[ASDFGamer]

I tried to search for settings that allow the usage as policys and I could only find UpdateMode. Is there a reason that this is the only policy or just that it would be too much work to add the other policys?
If it would be to much work I could add some policys.

[mkanat]

Hey, so Issue #27972 was duplicated to this, but that issue also covered being able to set defaults, which is the feature I actually need. I am one of the technical leads for Developer Productivity & Happiness at LinkedIn, and I'm working on testing and related activities. We would like to be able to set certain settings by default around test runners based on our environment, but allow developers to override those settings if they are not appropriate for what they are currently doing.

The description of this issue sounds like it will only support mandatory values, not defaults, is that correct? If so, is there any plan to be able to set organization-wide defaults through any mechanism?

[DeepCowProductions]

+1 for setting deployment defaults. Would be a very nice Feature.