Did you know about a list of videos that clearly illustrate the tips and tricks that VSCode is able to do that nobody has ever bothered to tell you about? Well if you didn’t, you do now…
The battle of the IDEs is well known and until recently the choice in programming language would also direct the choice in the IDE to do development too. But with the advent of the Language Server Protocol, which separates the language from the editor, the lines have been blurred because any IDE can now support any given language.
With many heavyweight options such as IntelliJ and VScode freely available, the competition is becoming fiercer than ever and inflicting collateral damage. One recent victim is the Komodo IDE which was finally let go to the community as an open source product and now its fate lies in the hands of the OSS community. And we know that OSS developers are not to be underestimated. Who knows, the community driven version might be even better. We’ve documented that ActiveState endeavor in the article “ActiveState Komodo Is Now Open Source Software”.
But when it all comes down to forcefully giving a definitive answer, in reality the choice is between IntelliJ and VSCode. IntelliJ is of course closely associated with Java and Kotlin, while VSCode with C# and the like. But as already said, this doesn’t count that much now. You can also do Javascript, Python and the likes in either one of them.
So what is there still left to try in order to capture the developer’s heart and mind? The answer is adding features, even specialized ones. For instance Intellij is looking to attract Azure users, by adding the Azure Toolkit, a plugin that provides templates and functionality with which you easily create, develop, test, and deploy Azure applications. VSCode meanwhile has Spring in its sights, adding support for making Spring based applications more mainstream, as examined in Microsoft goes all out on Java. At the end of that article however we concluded that
While VScode has made great improvements, it hasn’t yet reached the level of quality that IntelliJ gives to Java, especially in the code refactoring business. Still if you also program in other programming languages besides Java, then VSCode might be the most fitting option.
With that said, now days IDEs come with many bells and whistles and most of them are unknown to their users, who end up using just utilizing the basic 20-30% of their IDEs capabilities. As such VScode has many many features which “VsCode Can Do That?” brings to light. It contains 35 great tips in text and (unlisted) videos that will boost your productivity and reveal the true power behind your VSCode.
Here are a few samples :
Refactor Promises to Async/Await
VS Code can refactor promises in TypeScript into Async/Await. This includes multiple then statements, Promise. all() and Promise. race().
Pull Requests
The Github Pull Requests extension from Github allows you to view and interact with your Pull Requests directly from within VS Code.
Share your localhost
VS Code Live Share enables you to share any TCP process on your computer with people who are currently connected to your Live Share session. Choose “Share Server” from the Command Palette and select a port to share. Now they can access your localhost like it’s their localhost.
Refactor To ES6
VS Code can refactor your JavaScript to ES6. It can update imports, convert prototype functions to ES6 classes and more. Anytime you see an ellipsis, you may be able to refactor that code.
Docker
VS Code can configure, build, deploy, manage and even debug Docker containers with the Docker extension.
Debugging Browser Apps
Applications running in the browser can also be debugged in VS Code. These would be applications running on frameworks like Angular, React, Vue or others. This is facilitated by VS Code Launch Configurations.
Emmett
Emmet is a markup expansion tool that makes writing HTML much easier. It has a simple syntax and is not difficult to master. VS Code supports Emmett by default.
Update Image Size
VS Code can automatically update HTML img tags with the correct size of images. This works for images that are local to the project as well as images included by URL. It also works in CSS properties like `background-image`.
And many more!
Spending a few minutes in learning your IDE might later save you time exponentially. “VsCode Can Do That?” provides a good start.
More Information
VsCode Can Do That?
Related Articles
Microsoft Goes All Out On Java
Azure Toolkit for IntelliJ
ActiveState Komodo Is Now Open Source Software
Visual Studio Code Now Supports Virtual Threads
Run VSCode in the Browser
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