JHON Syntax Highlight

JHON === JinHui's Object Notation - A flexible configuration format

Overview

JHON is a JSON-like configuration format with flexible syntax and enhanced readability. This VSCode extension provides syntax highlighting support for JHON files (.jhon).

Features

• ✅ Full syntax highlighting for JHON files
• ✅ Automatic formatting with customizable options
• ✅ Support for single-line (//) and multi-line (/* */) comments
• ✅ Clean separators (commas or newlines)
• ✅ Support for nested objects and arrays
• ✅ String literals (including raw strings with r"..." and R"..." syntax)
• ✅ All JSON data types: strings, numbers, booleans, null
• ✅ Escape sequences and Unicode support
• ✅ Single and double-quoted strings
• ✅ Keys with hyphens (e.g., my-key=value)

JHON Syntax Example

// Application configuration
app_name="ocean-note"
version="1.0.0"

// Feature flags
features=["markdown" "collaboration" "real-time"]

// Database configuration
database={
  host="localhost"
  port=5432
  name="mydb"
  credentials=[
    {user="admin" role="owner"}
    {user="reader" role="readonly"}
  ]
}

// Numeric settings
max_file_size=1048576	timeout=30.5

debug=true
log_level="info"

Key Features of JHON

1. Clean Separators: Use commas or newlines to separate properties
2. Optional Quotes: Keys can be quoted or unquoted
3. Comments: Both single-line and multi-line comments supported
4. Nested Structures: Support for objects and arrays with unlimited nesting depth
5. Raw Strings: Use Rust-style r"..." syntax for strings without escape sequences
   • r"text" - basic raw string
   • r#"text with "quotes" "# - raw string with quotes
   • r##"text with ## hashes"## - add more # as needed
6. JSON-compatible: Can be converted to/from JSON

Raw String Examples

// Simple raw string
simple=r"Hello, World!"

// Raw string containing quotes
with_quotes=r#"He said "Hello" to me"#

// Multi-line raw string
multiline=r#"This is a
multi-line
string without escaping"#

// Raw string with special characters
path=r"C:\Users\name\file.txt"
regex=r#\d+\w+\s+#

Installation

From VSCode Marketplace

Search for "JHON Language Support" in the VSCode extensions panel.

Manual Installation

1. Download the latest .vsix file from the Releases page
2. Open VSCode
3. Go to Extensions → Click the "..." menu → Install from VSIX...
4. Select the downloaded file

Usage

Create a file with the .jhon extension and start writing JHON configuration. The extension will automatically provide syntax highlighting.

Formatter

The extension includes a powerful formatter with the following features:

Formatting Features

• Full document formatting: Format the entire document with Shift+Alt+F (Windows/Linux) or Shift+Option+F (Mac)
• Range formatting: Format selected text only
• Format on save: Automatically format when saving the file (can be enabled in VSCode settings)

Configuration Options

You can customize the formatter behavior in your VSCode settings (settings.json):

{
  // Enable/disable formatter (default: true)
  "jhon.format.enable": true,

  // Use spaces for indentation (default: true)
  "jhon.format.insertSpaces": true,

  // Number of spaces for indentation (default: 2)
  "jhon.format.tabSize": 2,

  // Sort object keys alphabetically (default: true)
  "jhon.format.sortKeys": true,

  // Add trailing commas to objects and arrays (default: false)
  "jhon.format.trailingCommas": false,

  // Align equals signs in objects (default: false)
  "jhon.format.alignEquals": false,

  // Quote style: "double", "single", or "auto" (default: "auto")
  "jhon.format.quoteStyle": "auto"
}

Formatter Examples

Before formatting:

database={host="localhost" port=5432 name="mydb"}
features=["markdown","collaboration","real-time"]
app_name="ocean-note" version="1.0.0" debug=true

After formatting (with default settings):

app_name = "ocean-note",
database = {
  host = "localhost",
  name = "mydb",
  port = 5432
},
debug = true,
features = [
  "markdown",
  "collaboration",
  "real-time"
],
version = "1.0.0"

After formatting (with alignEquals: true):

app_name  = "ocean-note",
database  = {
  host     = "localhost",
  name     = "mydb",
  port     = 5432
},
debug     = true,
features  = [
  "markdown",
  "collaboration",
  "real-time"
],
version   = "1.0.0"

File Association

The extension automatically associates .jhon files with the JHON language.

License

This project is licensed under the GNU General Public License v3.0 (GPL-3.0).

This means:

• ✅ Free to use, modify, and distribute
• ✅ All modifications must also be open source under GPL-3.0
• ❌ Cannot be used in proprietary/closed-source software
• ❌ Cannot be sublicensed with different terms

See the LICENSE file for the full text.

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please feel free to submit a Pull Request.

Support

If you find any bugs or have feature requests, please open an issue on GitHub Issues.

Author

Jinhui ZHANG - GitHub

Acknowledgments

• VSCode Extension API
• TextMate grammar system