Implement "Suggestion Mode" from Visual Studio

[macintacos]

In Visual Studio, there is a mode called "Suggestion Mode" that is described here in MS's documentation. This functionality is more succinctly described in this blog post. Basically, I would like for suggestions to be shown, but none "selected" until I actually wish to use them.

This has been brought up in several issues (at the very least #85768, #67698, #33725). I wanted to open a new issue to have the VSCode potentially reconsider this, since after reading one of the VSCode bot's links, it appears that older issues are unsubscribed by the team - it would be great to have this implemented.

Editing with some minor clarifications I provided in my comment below:

The ideal scenario that I personally am trying to have in VSCode is:

1. I type something into an editor and I get suggestions.
2. As I get those suggestions, none are "selected" until I hit "tab" or arrow-down the list of suggestions (I personally use "tab" to go through the suggestion list, but the point is that it should be an intentional choice for me to navigate through the list).
3. At this point, I decide what I want to do. If I intentionally navigate into the suggestion list and I have decided on an item I want to insert, I hit "enter" and VSCode completes the selection into the editor. If I don't navigate into this list, "enter" will just insert a line break.

[imericxu]

I’d like to add that from working in Neovim, I found it very intuitive to explicitly select and cycle through auto-completion suggestions with Ctrl + n and Ctrl + p or tabbing then accept with Enter. Currently, I’m resorting to accepting with the Tab key alongside the Vim extension.

[haoadoreorange]

@macintacos does editor.acceptSuggestionOnEnter solve the problem ?

[trivial-zero]

@macintacos does editor.acceptSuggestionOnEnter solve the problem ?

No, it is still selected

[haoadoreorange]

I mean it's still selected but enter make a new line, so shouldn't that be good ?

[macintacos]

@haoadoresorange no. I still want "enter" to be how completion items are chosen after navigating to them in the list. I just don't want anything in the quick suggestion list selected until I navigate into the list.

The ideal scenario that I personally am trying to have in VSCode is:

1. I type something into an editor and I get suggestions.
2. As I get those suggestions, none are "selected" until I hit "tab" or arrow-down the list of suggestions (I personally use "tab" to go through the suggestion list, but the point is that it should be an intentional choice for me to navigate through the list).
3. At this point, I decide what I want to do. If I intentionally navigate into the suggestion list and I have decided on an item I want to insert, I hit "enter" and VSCode completes the selection into the editor. If I don't navigate into this list, "enter" will just insert a line break.

Hopefully that adds some clarity to this feature request.

[haoadoreorange]

@macintacos I see, maybe add this to the original post above ?

[macintacos]

Sure, I've updated it.

[user72356]

Isn't that exactly how Visual Studio (2019) works? At least that's what I remember from my VS days. My muscle memory tells me so.

[imericxu]

@user72356 VS and VSCode are two different programs.

[user72356]

@user72356 VS and VSCode are two different programs.

So what? You expect people not to compare feature sets when they know something that works better elsewhere? Especially another MS product. You even made a comparison with Neovim youself, so what is your point?

[imericxu]

My bad, I misunderstood it as you saying the current functionality is expected, especially since you have a random username.

[jrieken]

This actually started with #151336

[macintacos]

Never thought I'd see the day - this seems to work pretty much exactly the way that I want it to, this is great!

For those who can't be bothered to open that issue, the setting is:

  "editor.suggest.selectQuickSuggestions": false,

It'll present as "disabled", but that appears to be on purpose. It still works.

[macintacos]

Actually... not quite. Thought it was working, but it doesn't seem to work the way I have selections set up with my keybindings.

Currently, as stated in the description, I use tab/shift+tab to navigate the suggestion list. This is set up like this:

  {
    "key": "tab",
    "command": "selectNextSuggestion",
    "when": "editorTextFocus && suggestWidgetMultipleSuggestions && suggestWidgetVisible"
  },
  {
    "key": "shift+tab",
    "command": "selectPrevSuggestion",
    "when": "editorTextFocus && suggestWidgetMultipleSuggestions && suggestWidgetVisible"
  }

With "editor.suggest.selectQuickSuggestions": false, the suggestion list isn't selected (great!) but tab doesn't seem to select the first item in the list and allow me to navigate through the list until I dismiss. Am I just missing a keybind/when-clause/command combination now?

[jrieken]

Yeah, there is a new focusSuggestion command which puts focus into the list first. By default it is bound to the trigger keybindings, e.g cmd+space etc. You should be able to configure it.

vscode/src/vs/editor/contrib/suggest/browser/suggestController.ts

Lines 884 to 895 in 6e2ee35

	registerEditorCommand(new SuggestCommand({
	id: 'focusSuggestion',
	precondition: ContextKeyExpr.and(SuggestContext.Visible, SuggestContext.HasFocusedSuggestion.negate(), ContextKeyExpr.equals('config.editor.suggest.selectQuickSuggestions', false)),
	handler: x => x.focusSuggestion(),
	kbOpts: {
	weight: weight,
	kbExpr: EditorContextKeys.textInputFocus,
	primary: KeyMod.CtrlCmd | KeyCode.Space,
	secondary: [KeyMod.CtrlCmd | KeyCode.KeyI],
	mac: { primary: KeyMod.WinCtrl | KeyCode.Space, secondary: [KeyMod.CtrlCmd | KeyCode.KeyI] }
	},
	}));

[macintacos]

@jrieken thanks! I'll look into that.

Yeah I'll share what I come up with - I just noticed that it's because it wasn't working when only one item was shown in the suggestion list, because then technically the suggestWidgetMultipleSuggestions would be false in that case (which was causing the default behavior - inserting a tab instead of navigating into the list). Trying to figure it out.

[macintacos]

Okay yeah adding this seems to make things work the way I expect:

  {
    "key": "tab",
    "command": "focusSuggestion",
    "when": "editorFocus && suggestWidgetVisible"
  },

[tristone13th]

Never thought I'd see the day - this seems to work pretty much exactly the way that I want it to, this is great!

For those who can't be bothered to open that issue, the setting is:

  "editor.suggest.selectQuickSuggestions": false,

It'll present as "disabled", but that appears to be on purpose. It still works.

Worked for me, thanks!

[jrieken]

👋 Attention: for next Insiders (which will be released after the break, #168000) I have renamed the setting to editor.suggest.selectionMode. Also, it is no longer a boolean anymore but allows for more fine grained control when it comes to auto suggest triggered by typing (aka quick suggest) or by trigger-characters.

Screen.Recording.2022-12-23.at.16.39.39.mov

[jrieken]

Closing - remaining work should be tackled as separate bugs or polish issues