Post on "tidyverse team's tips and tricks for using Positron"

[DavisVaughan]

• "window.nativeTabs" now that we have Open new windows in native tabs if option is set posit-dev/positron#9159

  • Personally also use "window.openFoldersInNewWindow": "on"

• File: Open Recent... with Cmd + Click option to open in new window

• "window.newWindowDimensions": "inherit" if you dont use native tabs

• "window.title": "${activeEditorShort}${separator}${rootName}${separator}${profileName}${separator}${activeRepositoryBranchName}"

  • Weirdly useful for knowing where I am

• Air related settings, using Air: Initialize Workspace Folder

• Language specific "editor.rulers"

• "files.insertFinalNewline": true and "files.trimFinalNewlines": true

• "search.quickOpen.includeSymbols": true to reproduce RStudio's Find file/function feature, this is 🔥. Makes Cmd + P include function names alongside file names.

• "debug.closeReadonlyTabsOnEnd": true to close debug tabs when debugger ends (does it work with virtual docs?)

• Customised look

  • "workbench.activityBar.location": "top"
  • "workbench.tree.renderIndentGuides": "none"
  • "terminal.integrated.lineHeight": 1.3
  • "workbench.tree.indent": 14

• Git related

  • "git.closeDiffOnOperation": true to auto close diff editors when you commit the file
  • "diffEditor.ignoreTrimWhitespace": false i think this should be on by default

[DavisVaughan]

• Extensions

  • Air
  • Tombi (for modifying air.toml)
  • CodeLLDB for C debugging
  • clangd for C language server features
  • GitHub Pull Requests (all hail the checkout pr feature)
  • Project Manager (Also Files: Open Recent..., but that doesn't work with any git directory on your machine)
  • Quarto
  • rust-analyzer
  • Rewrap (i use this daily, but it isn't perfect with roxygen2 comments)

[lionel-]

• Customised look

  • "window.customTitleBarVisibility": "never": Cleaner look with native tabs, but you now need to use the command palette (workbench.action.customizeLayout command) to change layout.

  • "workbench.tree.renderIndentGuides": "none"

  • "workbench.startupEditor": "none",

  • "editor.hover.enabled": false,: If getting mouse hovers drives you crazy, you can disable them and pop them up with a command / keyboard shortcut instead (editor.action.showHover command).

  • Increased panel separations

    "workbench.colorCustomizations": {
      "panel.border": "#444",
      "statusBar.border": "#444",
      "activityBar.border": "#444",
      "sideBar.border": "#444",
      "window.activeBorder": "#444",
      "window.inactiveBorder": "#000"
    },

• Workflow enhancers

  • "editor.rulers": [80]

  • "workbench.editor.pinnedTabsOnSeparateRow": true: Useful if you have tons of tabs in a project. This is not common with R prjects but good to know about.

  • "workbench.quickOpen.closeOnFocusLost": false: Don't lose your search area when you switch windows / native tabs.

• Workflow

  • Expand selection (powered by tree-sitter in R files!)
  • Launching Positron from command line
    • Install positron command on PATH
    • Use zoxyde to move around, then positron .

• Extensions

  • https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=jakearl.search-editor-apply-changes

We could also talk about the defaults we have changed from VS Code to give a better experience:

• debug.saveBeforeStart
• "workbench.tree.indent": 18

[lionel-]

We might have enough material for a series!

[EmilHvitfeldt]

Language specific "editor.rulers"

i use this, but i honestly don't see much value in it right now because air deals with the issue i used rulers for. BUT i still think it is worth pointing out that you can do language specific settings as that is a very useful feature

[lionel-]

It's still occasionally useful in comments as we don't yet rewrap them (although you can also use rewrap extensions)

[EmilHvitfeldt]

one of the super nice things about positron which is largely inherited from VS Code, is that is has support for so many other languages. Working on Lua -> install Lua extension, working on Javascript -> install Javascript extension, wanna format a .bib file -> install extension. Like I format and sort the settings JSON file with a extension

Same thing with themes, there are a wealth of theme extension that you can install and use. No need to recommend a specific one.

This used to be an extension but has been rebuilt in internally much much faster

"editor.bracketPairColorization.enabled": true
"editor.bracketPairColorization.independentColorPoolPerBracketType": true

This is not for everybody, as it is a little noisy, but i found it useful from time to time. I have no hard feelings if we don't talk about this

"editor.guides.bracketPairs": true
"editor.guides.bracketPairsHorizontal": false

[hadley]

Maybe something about trimming trailing whitespace and project specific settings? (i.e. I find I can't turn it on globally because it makes messy PRs when I have to do random revdep fixes)

[jennybc]

Highlight the preview mode behaviour and that we've found it's worth getting used to (vs. trying to suppress). But mainly: just help people identify this behaviour as a "thing", regardless of whether you want to lean in or turn it off.