Blind snippet insertion

[safield]

I have a workflow problem with snippets and completions.

I have concluded snippets and suggestions are different, and they should be treated separately. At the least, there should be a setting blindSnippetCompletion.

My issue is as follows.

1. I know my user snippets off by heart. I use them often, and deliberately. I don't need to a list to present my snippets to me. I don't need to shop around in a grocery list of snippets (and other suggestions) to find the right one. I just type the string and hit tab.

2. I like my snippets to work reliably 100% of the time. So when I type "msg1" followed by the tab key, I want my message write snippet to be placed 100% of the time. I don't want completion suggestions injected by language support extensions unpredictably interrupting my snippet insertion muscle memory.

3. I don't want any snippets cluttering up my quick suggestions list. Like I mentioned previously, I already know all my snippets, and in some cases I have to cycle through a couple snippets to get to the desired suggestion. I want the suggestions list exclusively for variable, method, and type completions.....not snippets.

With the current settings available in vscode...

"editor.snippetSuggestions": "bottom" Solves issue 3. but exacerbates issue 2.
"editor.snippetSuggestions": "top" Solves issue 2. but exacerbates issue 3.
"editor.snippetSuggestions": "inline" is worst of both worlds.

Enter blindSnippetCompletion.

With this setting enabled, pressing tab (insert snippet), will always prioritise snippet insertion over quick suggestion or intellisense completion. But snippets will never show up in completion suggestions lists.

[vscodebot]

(Experimental duplicate detection)
Thanks for submitting this issue. Please also check if it is already covered by an existing one, like:

• How to insert time in the Snippets (#17054)
• [json] don't suggest top level snippet if there's already an object (#53454)
• [snippet] Ability to add snippets from .vscode directory (#1947)
• [feature-request] Expand snippet only when it strictly matches with the prefix (#37826)
• Feature request - need more icons in snippets list (for Emmet, custom snippets, etc.) (#33121)

[jrieken]

We can offer these settings: "editor.tabCompletion": "onlySnippets", "editor.snippetSuggestions": "none", "editor.quickSuggestions": false, With them no snippets will ever show in the suggestion list, suggestions won't show as type (the prefix of a snippet), and pressing Tab after a snippet prefix will expand it.

[safield]

I can try those out, but "editor.tabCompletion" : "onlySnippets" sounds like it would disable word suggestions tab completion. This would not be desirable. It is just a matter of priority. To simpliify further...

1. Snippets should take priority during tab completion.
2. Snippets should not show up in suggestions list..

I could see how this could lead to confusing behaviour though. For example if I am unaware that my current typed string is a snippet, and then a snippet pops in unexpectedly, when I wanted to completion suggestion.

Alternative Solution...

A new command called editor.hardExecuteSnippet. This command, when run, looks at the immediately typed word at the caret , and inserts the snippet match, regardless of the state of the completion suggestion list.

This way, tab completion behaviours are left completely unmolested, but instead there is this one special command that a user could map to hard insert snippets.

[vscodebot]

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