Naive Definitions

Inspired by Fuzzy Definitions and Find All References

A Visual Studio Code extension that provides "Go to Definition" and "Find All References" functionality for various programming languages, using a fast textual search.

This extension is helpful when navigating large codebases, especially for weakly-typed languages or languages without good Language Server Protocol (LSP) support, where the built-in IntelliSense engine may fail to provide reliable definitions.

Features

• Supports "Go to Definition" and "Find All References" for multiple programming languages
• Configurable language-specific search patterns and file globs
• Respects .gitignore and other ignore files
• Blazing fast search using ripgrep

Requirements

• Install ripgrep and make it available in your system's $PATH (run rg in the command line to verify)

Extension Settings

This extension contributes the following settings:

• naiveDefinitions.languageConfigs: An array of language-specific configurations, each with the following properties:
  • languages: An array of programming language IDs to enable the extension for.
  • definitionPatterns: An array of regular expression patterns to use when searching for definitions. Use %s to represent the word at the cursor position. Note: These patterns may require escaping special characters depending on your programming language.
  • referencePatterns: An array of regular expression patterns to use when searching for references. Use %s to represent the word at the cursor position. Note: These patterns may require escaping special characters depending on your programming language.
  • fileGlobs: An array of file glob patterns to search within.

Example configuration:

{
  "naiveDefinitions.languageConfigs": [
    {
      "languages": [
        "javascript",
        "javascriptreact",
        "typescript",
        "typescriptreact",
        "vue"
      ],
      "definitionPatterns": [
        "(var|let|const)[^=]+\\b%s\\b",
        "\\b%s\\b\\s=[^=]+"
      ],
      "referencePatterns": ["\\b%s\\b"],
      "fileGlobs": ["**/*.js", "**/*.jsx", "**/*.ts", "**/*.tsx", "**/*.vue"]
    },
    {
      "languages": ["python"],
      "definitionPatterns": ["def\\s+%s\\s\\", "class\\s+%s\\s*\\("],
      "referencePatterns": ["\\b%s\\b"],
      "fileGlobs": ["**/*.py"]
    }
  ]
}

Release Notes

0.1.0 - Added support for configuring language-specific search patterns and file globs

• The extension is now activated on-demand when the user invokes the "Go to Definition" or "Find All References" commands, rather than on startup
• Improved performance by only registering providers for the configured languages

0.0.7 - Registered as a "Find All References" provider

0.0.6 - Added Windows support

0.0.5 - Added support for searching .vue files for definitions

0.0.2 - Added support for searching .ts and .tsx files for definitions

0.0.1 - Initial release