How GitHub Migrated 830K Lines to Rust with Copilot: Lessons for AI Refactoring
GitHub migrated its Copilot Agent Runtime from TypeScript to Rust using Copilot, rewriting 832K production lines and 468K test lines over 14.5 weeks with 128 PRs while shipping 135 releases; the author distills six reusable strategies for AI-assisted large-scale refactoring including codebase familiarization, behavioral compatibility, file-based task management, incremental slicing, orchestration, and testing guardrails.
