Need help diagnosing some indentation behavior

[dhicks]

I've been trying out Positron this week, and after struggling a lot with indentation I've hit upon an especially baffling pattern. I could use some help trying to figure out what's going on.

I have a folder structure (simplified) as follows:

.
├── project.Rpoj
├── script1.R
└─── subdir
    └─── script2.R

I don't have a settings.json or air.toml within this folder structure.

I open Positron, then open the top-level folder. Both script files are open in editors. Making no changes to either file, I hit save for script1.R and it's formatted with editor.tabSize or indent-width as 2. I do the same thing with script2.R and it's formatted with 4 (which is what I want).

I completely close Positron, reopen it, repeat as above. script1.R is formatted with tab size/indent of 4, and script2.R with a tab size/indent of 2.

Close and repeat, and the formatting is swapped again. This pattern repeated through maybe six attempts. Now script1.R is stable with a tab size of 2, and script2.R at 4.

Pasting my user settings file below.

{
    "files.associations": {
        "renv.lock": "json"
    },
    "git.openRepositoryInParentFolders": "always",
    "editor.fontSize": 14,
    "editor.tabSize": 4,
    "editor.indentSize": "tabSize",
    "workbench.keybindings.rstudioKeybindings": true,
    "window.restoreWindows": "none",
    "workbench.localHistory.enabled": false,
    "files.restoreUndoStack": false,
    "workbench.editor.restoreViewState": false,
    "git.confirmSync": false,
    "git.autofetch": true,
    "editor.detectIndentation": false,
    "terminal.integrated.persistentSessionReviveProcess": "never",
    "workbench.startupEditor": "none",
    "zenMode.restore": false,
    "files.hotExit": "off",
    "workbench.editor.empty.hint": "hidden",
    "editor.formatOnSave": true
}

[juliasilge]

I suspect this may be happening because of this:

positron/extensions/positron-r/package.json

Line 358 in fd2186c

"editor.tabSize": 2,

We contribute a default tabSize for R files, and I bet something weird is going on between your user setting and this contributed setting (which is technically in an extension, although one that is built in). You can check this out in the default settings which you can get to from Preferences: Open Default Settings (JSON) but you can't change those default settings.

What I recommend is that you additionally set your preference for R specifically:

	"[r]":  {
		"editor.tabSize": 4
	}

Can you try that out and see if that keeps you from seeing that super weird behavior?

[dhicks]

That seems to be working so far, thanks!

Checking the docs on https://positron.posit.co, I don't see a page explaining all the different places where preferences are set and how they're prioritized when they conflict. If that's genuinely missing, I can create a feature suggestion.

[juliasilge]

That's a great idea; I added this to #7208 (comment).