Crack the Whip

A purely cosmetic, just-for-fun VS Code extension that overlays an animated whip on your screen while you wait for your AI to respond.

⚠️ This does absolutely nothing to improve AI response speed. It will not make Claude, Copilot, or ChatGPT any faster. It just feels great to crack a whip while you wait.

Usage

Press Shift+1 (default) to toggle the whip on/off. Move your mouse to swing it. When the tip moves fast enough, you hear it crack.

Press Escape at any time to dismiss the whip.

Configuration

Open Settings (Ctrl+,) and search for whip:

Setting	Default	Description
`whip.screamsEnabled`	`true`	Play a synthesised scream when the whip cracks. Toggle this off if you're in a meeting (or have a soul).
`whip.screamsVolume`	`1.0`	Volume of the scream, from `0.0` (silent) to `1.0` (full). Does not affect the crack sound itself.

Both settings take effect immediately — no restart required.

Changing the keybinding

The default key is Shift+1. To rebind it:

Open Keyboard Shortcuts (Ctrl+K Ctrl+S)
Search for Crack the Whip: Toggle Whip
Click the pencil icon and press your preferred key

How it works

The extension injects a transparent canvas overlay on top of all VS Code windows (including Claude Code chat tabs and webview panels). The whip is simulated with Verlet rope physics and rendered with Catmull-Rom splines.

Keyboard events are intercepted via VS Code's command system, so the whip works even when webview iframes (like AI chat tabs) have keyboard focus.

Removing the overlay

Run the command palette (Ctrl+Shift+P) → Crack the Whip: Remove Whip Overlay, then restart VS Code. This cleanly removes the injected script from VS Code's workbench HTML.

Crack the Whip

Backfisch Fish Production

Crack the Whip

Usage

Configuration

Changing the keybinding

How it works

Removing the overlay