/instructions command does not show ~/.copilot/instructions/*.instructions.md user-level files

[ericnewton76]

Describe the bug

The /instructions command shows an empty picker ("No instructions") even when user-level instruction files exist at ~/.copilot/instructions/*.instructions.md.

The CLI help text lists \C:\Users\Eric/.copilot/copilot-instructions.md as a respected location, and the v0.0.412 changelog confirms ~/.copilot/instructions/*.instructions.md support was added — but neither location appears in the /instructions picker.

Affected version

GitHub Copilot CLI 1.0.22

Steps to reproduce the behavior

1. Create ~/.copilot/instructions/global.instructions.md with any content (no frontmatter)
2. Launch copilot in any directory (tested both git repo and non-git directory)
3. Run /instructions
4. Observed: picker is empty — the file is not listed

Also reproduced with the legacy ~/.copilot/copilot-instructions.md path — also not shown.

Expected behavior

/instructions should list ~/.copilot/instructions/global.instructions.md with an [external] label, as suggested by the v1.0.4 changelog entry:

"Show individual instruction file names in /instructions picker with [external] labels for injected files"

The instructions are being injected into prompts (the CLI help text and docs confirm these paths are respected), but the files are invisible to the /instructions picker.

Additional context

• OS: Windows 11
• Terminal: Windows Terminal
• Shell: PowerShell 7
• The user-level instructions do appear to be loaded (content is reflected in agent behavior), so this is a display/enumeration bug in the /instructions command specifically
• Possibly related: the issue may be worse or exclusive to non-git-repo working directories — /instructions may only enumerate files discovered via git-root traversal, inadvertently skipping the user-level ~/.copilot/instructions/ directory

[ericnewton76]

no git repo

in a git repo

[ericnewton76]

btw when i /cwd .. out of a git repo and /new, i'm back to no instructions at all: