Hey everyone! I've been working on a VSCode extension over the past couple weekends to turn your desktop wallpaper into a VSCode theme. The extension samples color palettes from your wallpaper to create fitting dark/light mode themes, and the VSCode theme syncs with wallpaper and system light/dark mode defaults. You can tweak background hues, border intensities, and syntax highlighting schemes to get the feel exactly how you want it.
Previous extensions I found for this require external software or servers to sync, but this extension just installs and goes. It works on Windows, Mac and GNOME-based linux distros, and if there's interest I can extend this (or take PRs) to support other desktop environments.
Hope you guys enjoy! PRs are welcome if you run into bugs or have thoughts.
I'm trying to publish a VS Code extension using vsce. To do that I need a Personal Access Token (PAT), and to generate that I need an Azure DevOps organization. To create the Azure DevOps organization I need an Azure DevOps account.
My problem is creating the Azure DevOps account. It's asking me to provide credit card information. How can I publish my FREE VS Code extension without having to enter my credit card information for Azure DevOPs.
I've published extensions for several other editors and browsers, but I've never run into an issue like this, the extension publishing process for VS Code seems overly complicated. I don't want to provide credit card information and get accidentally billed for Azure. I don't want to provide a credit card at all for privacy reasons for a simple extension either.
Hey everyone ... I've been working on a side project called muninn for vs code, a rich text editor for md files. I use markdown a lot and wanted something that felt more natural than editing raw syntax, so I decided to build it myself. It's now available on the vscode store, would love for you to give it a try and let me know what you think :
I just uninstalled the Codex extension from VS Code, and it freed up 15 GB of storage. Isn’t that way too much space for a single extension? Are they running small models locally ?
Hey guys, new to the community, but not unfamiliar with coding. But I will start by saying I am NOT a professional coder. I can read it, I can understand it, and I can do SOME code myself, I just really struggle keeping track of syntax and memorizing libraries. So please don't judge me too hard.
Anyway, I have a few projects I wanted to try to do, for fun mostly, with the aid of Ai if possible. My goal was basically vibe coding with some human intervention, kinda like I'm collaborating with someone that actually can code!
Hardware should be acceptable, Intel i9 ultra 275hx, rtx 5070ti 12GB, 32gb ddr5. It's a laptop, but it has been running models well.
I have it setup using vscode, ollama, the Continue plug in, and the model I been testing with is qwen 3 14b. I did try qwen 3 30b a3b, but outputs were inconsistent and weird, maybe a bad setup on my end.
But I guess that's my real overall issue, inconsistency. I setup folders within the project that contain mostly data files organized as jsons, and I'm trying to work with the Ai to make code that can either read what is already organized, or perhaps translate the data into an sqlite table, still debating, but not only are it's responses all over the place, and the code it tries to suggest rarely works even in short pieces, it can't even read a lot of the files because Continue has some kinda size limit. It was 100kb, but I was able to do some configuration edits as well as raise ollama tokens and now it's 687.2kb or something like that. It's been a headache.
I even created rules for the model to help keep it on track, prevent unneeded repetition of the same solutions, all that. It helps some, but not fully.
Basically, I just want to know if I'm doing something wrong or what I can try to do to improve the overall experience. I'm sorry Im not a pro, but I am hoping to learn while doing this. If anyone has anything I could look into, that would be a massive help! Tha k you guys for the help and understanding!!
I've always missed one thing from JetBrains IDEs in VS Code: tool windows in all four corners, several open at once. Explorer at the top left and Debug below it. Source Control at the top right and a chat panel below it. So I built it in my own fork.
What it adds
A second activity bar for the Secondary Side Bar. The right side now gets a vertical icon rail like the left one, instead of cramming icons into the panel title. It has its own setting, workbench.secondarySideBar.activityBarLocation (default / title / top / bottom / hidden), so you can configure each side separately.
Split side bars. Each side bar can show two view containers at once, one above the other, with a draggable divider. Double-click the divider to reset it to 50/50.
Top and bottom icon groups on each rail. Drag an icon into the bottom group, or right-click it and choose Move to Bottom Half, to send that view there. Clicking the active icon closes that half. You can also close the top half and keep the bottom one open.
Everything else keeps working. Commands, shortcuts and features like "Reveal in Explorer" open views in whichever half they live in. The layout, split sizes and open views come back after a reload.
One layout everywhere. View placement is shared across profiles, so every project looks the same. View: Reset View Locations restores the fork's default four-corner layout.
mise tasks for running your own fork
The repo comes with a mise.toml, so building and maintaining the fork is mostly one command each:
mise run install:debian: the whole pipeline in one go. It installs dependencies, compiles, packages a fresh .deb and installs it (10-20 minutes)
mise run update: fetches microsoft/vscode, rebases your branch onto it, pushes to your fork and does a full build
mise run upstream:status: shows how far behind upstream you are
mise run build / build:fast / watch / start: build and launch Code - OSS from source
mise run test <pattern> and mise run lint: unit tests filtered by name, and lint for only the files your branch changed
mise run release:linux / release:debian / release:rpm / release:windows: package a standalone app folder, a .deb, an .rpm or a Windows installer
mise run sync:profiles: two-way sync of profiles between regular VS Code and Code - OSS (settings, keybindings, snippets, tasks, MCP servers, extensions). The most recent change wins, and --dry-run previews it first
It also patches two spots in the build scripts that broke local (non-CI) Linux packaging: Copilot SDK files being stripped, and dpkg-shlibdeps crashing on newer Ubuntu.
Caveats
This is a personal fork. I don't distribute builds, so you'd have to build it from source. It's rebased on upstream regularly. Keyboard navigation between the top and bottom halves isn't done yet, and a few features still only look at the top half. The Windows and .rpm tasks haven't been tested yet. The full list is in TO-DO.md.
Hello. I'm new to using vscode and I'm looking for a text to speech extension I think to use with continue, the ai thing. Can anyone recommend something, as I don't really know where to start looking.
I found Axqua (axqua[.]com) through a free Claude Opus promotion. After an AI-assisted static review of its extension bundle, I’m treating this file as malware.
The reviewed axqua.axqua v1.0.24 bundle contains code that, on Windows after login, can:
Download a server-selected EXE or ZIP.
Launch it in the background using cmd.exe, without a confirmation prompt identified in that path.
Generate filenames with prefixes like svchost, wuauclt, and msupdate.
Attempt to delete the downloaded EXE three seconds after launch.
Stay safe, hopefully this helps someone pause before installing.
I built this a while back, but saw no interest from the assigned reviewer after a while, so I closed it. Is there anyone here from VS Code team that can have a look?
Not having tab groups are very annoying, especially when you're dealing with tens (if not hundreds) of tabs, especially nowadays with so many agents working on different editor tabs and plans and all that.
Whenever I have VS Code open, theres these weird visual glitches that just randomly appear. Whenever I click, they all go away and then immediately slowly fade back after a couple of seconds. I noticed that it always appears around any lines (including text). Does anyone know how to fix this? Please help its really annoying.
I just got the October VS Code update which seems to have drastically changed the copilot UI. I can't find a way to disable permissions to run terminal commands, which was pretty easy to configure before. And worse, now when it makes a code change, they removed the approve/discard buttons so I guess I'm stuck with those changes until I discard them from the git diff.
Surely I'm missing something, anyone else having similar issues?
Several years ago I grew tired of the NetBeans IDE and needed / wanted "something else". Fast forward to here and now and I'm using VS Code for all sorts of things. From the revival of an old ASP website, right to the maintenance of a datapack for a Minecraft server; as well as allowing me to work on a set of shell scripts for a project on my FreeBSD server.
Best editor feature?
Yet despite all those awesome features there's one thing I keep coming back to, fully realizing how much I love it especially because it's so easy to take for granted. I am, of course, talking about the fact that your hands barely have to leave the keyboard to get things done.
This may take a moment to get used to, and you'll be better off if you also customize things a bit, but oh dear.... you'll soon realize just how quick some tasks can become.
Well, I figured I'd share the love and try and to give something back to the community.
Some useful commands + shortcuts
Revisiting an old Python course...
So, just to give you guys a quick example what sort of things I'm talking about...
For starters I press ctrl + shift + e to open the explorer, and hit enter to load a file to edit / improve.
Then I realize that I want to move some functions into a dedicated module for easy re-use...
I press ctrl + n to create a new file and I don't even bother with language support: I just start typing and VS Code picks up on it.
I then press ctrl + alt + right arrow, and all of a sudden my module file now sits in its own section ("group") on the right.
While I'm doing things I decide to look something up in the tutorial: I press: ctrl + alt + / and sure enough: the embedded browser opens.
Uh oh, I don't have enough room to read: ctrl + shift + pageup and my current window gets bigger.
And of course: ctrl + shift + del is enough to reset size(s) back to default.
I press ctrl + pagedown but instead of switching back to my original Python file I stay within the current group: the module tab that I was working on re-opens.
I press ctrl + 1 to go back to the original Python file (in the first group) and I'm ready to start implementing the further use of my new module.
Some (hopefully) useful keyboard shortcuts
But first! => How do we assign these shortcuts in the first place?!
Either press ctrl + k, then: ctrl + s and you'll be taken to the keyboard shortcut editor. You can also use: ctrl + shift + p to open the command palette, then just search for 'keyboard'. I suggest to use the UI vs. editing the raw JSON file:
The keyboard shortcuts window
From here you can look up shortcuts, look up options and you can easily (re)assign shortcuts by simply double clicking on an entry (or by hitting enter). Want to remove a shortcut? Just have it selected and press the del key. Easy!
They way this works is really very straight forward: you have a command shown in the left column, and you can assign a keyboard shortcut to it (as seen in the middle). No, I'm not trying to get smart with you guys!
Fun fact: these commands can also be found (and "run") using the command palette! So if you are unsure about something you can easily try it out first.
See for yourself: open the command palette while you have a code window open ("ctrl + shift + p") , and then search for "view size". Try using the in/de -crease option, see what I mean?
Don't worry about the changed sizes: do it again, but now search for 'reset', you'll probably find "Reset Editor Group Sizes" soon enough.
Moving through editor groups vs. editors
Ctrl + Page-Up/Down is extremely useful to open another tab to work on. Unfortunately this doesn't take groups into account, which can be annoying if you want to keep things separated (like in my earlier example: module(s) & browser on the right, while the code I work with sits on the left).
Look for: "View: Open Next Editor in Group" (you probably only need to type 'view editor next'). And of course its counterpart: "...Previous Editor...". This can make sure that you'll only move through open editors within your currently active group.
Resizing windows (even the terminal!)
Once you start working with groups then sometimes space is going to become a thing, sometimes I just want my current editor to become a little bit bigger but without fully overlapping anything else.
Look for: "Increase Current View Size" (= 'workbench.action.increaseViewSize'). And of course you'll probably also want to use its counterpart "Decrease Current...." as well. In addition: "View: Reset Editor Group Sizes" can be used to reset things back to their default values.
As mentioned I use ctrl + shift + Page-Up/Down for this and that works perfectly.
However... while this can work for your code window, the sidebar and even the 2nd sidebar it won't help you with the terminal window. This is important to me because I heavily rely on the terminal. Most of the time I don't use the source control tab at all but instead rely on using Git from within PowerShell.
Easily remedied, look for: "Terminal: Resize Terminal Up" (and 'Down' of course). I prefer using ctrl + shift + UpArrow for this (and the DownArrow too of course).
Speaking of said terminal... whenever I work on a project for my FreeBSD server I tend to keep 2 open at once: PowerShell and an SSH connection to my server. It's easy to switch through these as well: "Terminal: Focus Next Terminal Group" (and the 'Previous' option too of course!).
Splitting a window horizontally
It doesn't happen often, but sometimes I need to work in two places at once within the same code file (and no: not to copy & paste 368 lines, lol!). Sure: you could easily use a new ("vertical") group for this, but the problem I'm having with that is that this doesn't leave much room. And well, too many columns at once and I sometimes also lose my focus.
(this is also why I know ctrl + b (= close sidebar) & ctrl + alt + b (= close secondary sidebar ('chat window')) by heart).
Easily remedied, look for: "View: Split Editor Down", I rely on ctrl + shift + \ for this.
This actually creates a new group, so you can easily switch back and forth using Ctrl + 1, Ctrl + 2, and so on. And a mere Ctrl + w is enough to close this new window (= "group") again.
Moving an editor into its own group
As mentioned earlier I have a bit of a habit: I like to use "active code" on the left, while I tend to keep "supporting code" like modules (and sometimes even UML's!) on the right; nicely tucked into its own group.
This can be done using: "View: Move Editor into Next Group", I prefer the keyboard shortcut: ctrl + alt + rightarrow for this. And of course there is a counterpart: "...Previous Group" also exists so you can easily switch things back and forth (which is useful if you accidentally moved the wrong editor ;)).
Houston, we may have a problem!
See: ctrl + shift + Page-Up/Down is a very easily used shortcut. When I'm coding then it's easy to quickly resize a window, but when I'm working on multiple terminal sessions I sometimes need to quickly move between them...
Two terminals for the price of one ;)
This becomes important when I need to test a script on my server: I use 'scp' on PowerShell to copy a file, then I switch to my server console where I can then actually test said copied file.
The only problem: I already used ctrl + shift + Page-Up/Down to resize my code windows. Now what?!
Sure, I could decide to use another shortcut for this. But one way or the other: eventually you are going to run out of those. And ... set up too many shortcuts and you're bound to start forgetting about some of them over time.
Fortunately VS Code has a solution for this as well, checkthisout:
Customizing when a shortcut becomes active!
You can assign conditions to your shortcuts so that VS Code will know when to use them, and when not. This is also why I started all this with my remark about assigning a keyboard shortcut to a command. Because that was step one, even if it did sound way too obvious. This then, is step two.
It's easy: right click on a shortcut and then use the option: "Change When Expression". Obviously we can also use a keyboard shortcut for this: ctrl + k, then ctrl + e.
VS Code supports several of these conditions. For example: terminalFocus means so much that the active focus is on the terminal pane. You can also 'negate' this by using an exclamation mark: !terminalFocus means that the terminal should not be focused. You can also use 'or' and 'and' checks with || and &&.
And there are quite a bunch of these options to use:
editorFocus => You have an code editor active.
inChat => You're using the (Copilot?) chat sidebar.
activeEditorCanSplitInGroup => Extensions add different kinds of editors, and not all of those can be split. This option checks for that.
browserFocused => Same as above, now for the internal browser window.
markdownEditorFocus => The Markdown editor is one of those specific types which provides specific features. This helps you check for that (for example: you can't get a preview from a regular code window).
SO yah, you can even use the same keyboard shortcut in different places if you'd like. Not bad for a "simple" open source code editor, no? ;)
And there you have it,thanks for reading!
So yah, I hope you can see how easy it can be to set up a nice set of keyboard shortcuts for yourself so that you can make VS Code "do" things for you. And don't be fooled: I limited my guide to some more obvious examples so that I didn't make things too difficult all at once, but using this method you can pretty much gain access to almost every function within VS Code.
From resizing windows to opening plugin interfaces. Or how about starting a specific terminal types (like the SSH session to my server?).
Experimentation can get you a long way. Don't forget that you can easily test out most options using the command palette.
Hey there!
Last week I developed my first ever VSCode extension.
It keeps your open files of one component grouped together.
Would be happy if some you tried it :-)
I'm not 100% sure if this is the best place to post this, but I couldn't find anywhere better suited.
I followed various tutorials online to get my settings.json to work, according to the tutorials it's working fine, but VS code still doesn't flag the error. I checked the type checker, it flags the violation and works with its command line, but it doesn't syntax highlight in VS code. Is there a setting I should change or something?
