Proposal: Split current REPL "run" actions to support independent line and cell execution

[gepcel]

Currently, the REPL supports two actions: "run" and "run in place." Their behavior follows the logic below:

1. If there are no cells (like "# %%" in Python):

   1. If some code is selected, execute the selected lines.
   2. If no code is selected, execute the current line (where the cursor is).

2. However, if there is cell markers (# %% in Python)—even just one in the entire file—it is no longer possible to execute a single line or a selection of lines. The REPL will always execute a cell or selected cells instead.

I would like to propose splitting the two existing actions into four distinct actions (combined with cursor movement):

1. Run line or selected lines.
2. Run line or selected lines in place.
3. Run cell or selected cells.
4. Run cell or selected cells in place.

And maybe two other actions if neccessary:

5. Run Above
6. Run All

Additionally, software such as Atom+Hydrogen, Spyder, Positron, PyCharm, RStudio, and Visual Studio Code with relevant extensions all generally support the features mentioned above. It would be great if the developers could implement similar functionality. Or if the developers agree with the above suggestion, I would be glad to submit a pull request for review as a starting point.

[gepcel]

I would like to note that a similar request for these actions has been previously discussed in issue #19031. Additionally, a request for a Run All feature is documented in issue #16961.

[gepcel]

Proposal seems not popular.
There's a workable pl in #46868, and a forked branch, tested in python. Anyone interested in this is welcomed to picked it up from there. I'll let the dev to decide whether to leave this proposal open or closed.

[nlgranger]

Proposal seems not popular.

It's interesting to me ;-)

How is one supposed to show support ? By voting under the first message here or subscribing to the linked issue or to the PR ?

[gepcel]

Try zed with #46868 if you may.

[nlgranger]

Overall the changes seem to work well without crashes.

The action of the alt+return has changed from executing the bloc to executing the line/selection. I think it would be less disrupting to leave the current behaviour as-is (it matches vscode) and assign a new shortcut for line/selection execution.

In the shortcut bar, I think it would be convenient to have quick access buttons for run all, clear all and interrupt, since these are used quite often and therefore F1+typing the command is a bit tedious for that.

I don't remember if it was the case in the release version of ZED but I'm having to close and reopen the file when opening a new project in order to get repl options to show up and work.

[gepcel]

I think it would be less disrupting to leave the current behaviour as-is (it matches vscode)

Previously, the button behaviour combined “run line” and “run cell (or block)” into a single action, now this is splitted into two kinds of actions. All newly added actions come with no default keyboard shortcuts — I assign them myself via the keymap setting and suggest others do the same. While I believe assigning default shortcuts would be better, whether to do so and which keys to use is ultimately the dev team’s decision. Currently, both Alt+Return and the button click act line wise not block wise; I’m open to switching that to execute the block if more people prefer that behaviour.

In the shortcut bar, I think it would be convenient to have quick access buttons for run all, clear all and interrupt

Personally, I'm fine with any actions added to quick access buttons. @rgbkrk (it seems that he or she is from the dev team) suggests not to overload the menu with too many options. I don’t want to decide by myself which actions appear in the menu and which don’t — let’s see what the dev team thinks about this.

but I'm having to close and reopen the file when opening a new project in order to get repl options to show up and work.

Besides that the default click behaviour changed from execute block to execute line, nothing else is changed, can you give more details?