DCS Launcher

DCS Launcher is a Visual Studio Code extension that lets you launch Digital Combat Simulator (DCS) missions directly from VS Code, bypassing the main menu.
It’s designed for rapid iteration, making it ideal for EFM, avionics, systems, and mission development.

Launch missions with one click or a keybind — no more navigating menus between test runs.

✨ Features

• 🚀 One-click mission launch from the VS Code Activity Bar
• 📂 Per-workspace mission lists (stored in .vscode/settings.json)
• ⚙️ Global DCS.exe configuration (set once, reuse everywhere)
• ⌨️ Keybinding to relaunch the last mission
• 🧠 Remembers the last launched mission across restarts
• 🪟 Uses native Windows process spawning (no PowerShell issues)
• 🎯 Perfect for rapid EFM / cockpit / systems testing

🧭 How It Works

1. Configure the path to DCS.exe once (global setting)
2. Add one or more .miz files to your workspace settings
3. Select a mission from the DCS Launcher sidebar
4. DCS launches directly into the mission, skipping the menu

⚙️ Requirements

• Windows
• DCS World installed
• Visual Studio Code v1.108.0 or newer

Recommended: use the bin-mt version of DCS for multithreaded builds.

🛠 Extension Settings

This extension contributes the following settings:

Global (User Settings)

• dcsLauncher.dcsExePath
  Full path to DCS.exe

"dcsLauncher.dcsExePath": "C:\\Program Files\\Eagle Dynamics\\DCS World\\bin-mt\\DCS.exe"

Workspace (Per Project)

• dcsLauncher.missions
  List of mission files to show in the launcher

"dcsLauncher.missions": [
  "Missions/weapon_test.miz",
  "Missions/night_run.miz",
  "C:/Users/you/Saved Games/DCS/Missions/debug.miz"
]

Relative paths are resolved from the workspace root.

⌨️ Keybindings

Default Keybinding

• Launch Last Mission

F8

This instantly relaunches the most recently launched mission, perfect for tight edit-test cycles.

You can rebind this in:

File → Preferences → Keyboard Shortcuts

Search for “DCS Launcher”.

📌 Commands

• DCS Launcher: Launch Mission
• DCS Launcher: Launch Last Mission
• DCS Launcher: Select DCS Executable

All commands are available from the Command Palette.

🧪 Known Issues

• Does not currently detect if DCS is already running
• No mission add/remove UI yet (missions are managed via settings)

🗺️ Roadmap

Planned improvements:

• ➕ Add missions via file picker
• 🔄 Refresh button in mission list
• ▶️ Play / Stop toggle (detect running DCS)

📦 Release Notes

0.1.0

• Initial functional release
• Sidebar launcher
• Mission list per workspace
• Global DCS path
• Keybinding for last mission

🤝 Contributing

Contributions, suggestions, and bug reports are welcome.
This extension was built to support real-world DCS development workflows, so feedback from other developers is highly valued.

📄 License

MIT

Happy flying — and happy debugging. ✈️