Copy4AI

Copy4AI (formerly SnapSource) is a powerful Visual Studio Code extension that allows you to easily copy file and folder contents along with the project tree structure to your clipboard. It automatically ignores dot files, respects .gitignore rules, and provides plaintext, markdown, and XML output formats. This tool is particularly useful when working with Large Language Models (LLMs) and you need to provide context about your project.

🚀 Features

• 📋 Copy contents of files, folders, or multiple selections to your clipboard along with the project tree structure.
• 🔒 Configurable dot file handling (.env, .git, .github, etc.).
• 🚫 Respect .gitignore rules and custom exclude patterns.
• 🌳 Configurable project tree depth.
• 📄 Three output formats: plaintext, markdown, and XML.
• ⚡ Asynchronous processing for improved performance with large directories.
• 🛡️ Robust error handling for various edge cases.
• 🧠 Smart binary file detection to exclude non-text content.
• 📏 Configurable file size limit to prevent oversized outputs.
• 🔧 Option to include or exclude project tree structure in the output.
• 🗜️ Simple code compression option for more compact output.
• 🧹 Option to remove comments from code.
• 🔢 Token counting and cost estimation for various LLM models.

🔧 How to Use

1. Select one or multiple files or folders in the VS Code Explorer.
2. Right-click and select one of the following options:
   • Copy to Clipboard (Copy4AI): Copies the selected files/folders with their content
   • Copy Project Structure (Copy4AI): Copies only the project tree structure of the selected folder (or entire workspace if no folder is selected)
3. The content will be copied to your clipboard, excluding dot files, binary files, and respecting ignore patterns and size limits.
4. Paste the content into your preferred LLM interface.

Additional commands:

• Use the Toggle Project Tree (Copy4AI) command from the Command Palette to quickly enable or disable project tree inclusion in the output without changing settings.
• Use the Toggle Dot Files Inclusion (Copy4AI) command from the Command Palette to quickly switch between including or excluding dot files (like .github) without changing settings.

A progress indicator will show the status of the operation, especially useful for large files or when token counting is enabled.

⚙️ Extension Settings

This extension contributes the following settings:

Note: By default, dot files are ignored, but this can be changed with the copy4ai.ignoreDotFiles setting. Set it to false to include .github and other dot directories. Binary files are automatically detected and excluded.

📊 Output Formats

1. Plaintext: A simple text format with clear sections for project structure (if enabled) and file contents.
2. Markdown: A formatted markdown output with code blocks for project structure (if enabled) and file contents.
3. XML: A structured XML format with separate sections for project structure and file contents.

📋 Requirements

• Visual Studio Code version 1.89.0 or higher

🐛 Known Issues

None at this time.

📝 Release Notes

1.1.0

Major Update - TypeScript Migration

• Major refactoring: Complete migration from JavaScript to TypeScript for enhanced type safety and maintainability
• Restructured codebase into modular architecture with dedicated service classes
• Improved error handling, file extension detection, and dependency management
• Comprehensive repository cleanup removing orphaned and legacy files
• All 19 tests passing with enhanced test coverage

Technical Improvements

• Better separation of concerns with dedicated utility classes
• Enhanced code maintainability and extensibility
• Optimized dependency structure and build process
• Cleaner API design with well-defined TypeScript interfaces

1.0.21

Added

• Enhanced GitHub Actions workflow to publish to both Visual Studio Marketplace and Open VSX Registry
• Upgraded to HaaLeo/publish-vscode-extension@v2 for better performance and features
• Single packaging with reuse pattern for more efficient publishing process

1.0.20

Fixed

• CRITICAL FIX: Resolved issue where files with unsupported encodings (UTF-16, UTF-32) would cause the extension to stop processing subsequent files (fixes #8)
• Improved error handling to ensure all processable files are included even when some files cannot be read
• Enhanced encoding detection to better identify and handle non-UTF-8 files

Added

• Better error messages for files with unsupported encodings
• Comprehensive test coverage for encoding issues and error handling scenarios

1.0.19

Added

• Improved "Copy Project Structure" command to use the selected folder as root
• When right-clicking on a specific folder, only that folder's structure will be copied

For a full list of changes, please see the CHANGELOG.md file.

🛠️ Development

This extension is built with TypeScript and uses the VS Code Extension API. The codebase follows modern TypeScript best practices with a modular architecture.

Building

npm run compile    # Compile TypeScript to JavaScript
npm run watch      # Watch mode for development
npm run lint       # Run ESLint
npm test          # Run tests

Architecture

The extension is organized into modular utility classes:

• ConfigurationService - Centralized configuration management
• FileProcessor - File processing and encoding detection
• ProjectTreeGenerator - Project structure generation
• OutputFormatter - Different output formats (markdown, XML, plaintext)
• IgnoreUtils - Handling ignore patterns and exclusions
• TokenCounter - Token counting and cost estimation

💬 Feedback and Contributions

If you have any feedback or would like to contribute to the development of Copy4AI, please visit our GitHub repository.

Exclusion Configuration

The copy4ai.exclude setting provides precise control over what files and directories are excluded:

"copy4ai.exclude": {
  "paths": ["src/config", "vendor/unwanted-package"],
  "patterns": ["node_modules", "*.log", "*.tmp"]
}

• paths: Absolute paths relative to workspace root. These are exact path matches that will exclude specific directories or files regardless of their name. This solves the problem of excluding directories with common names (like "config") in specific locations while keeping others.
• patterns: Standard glob patterns for more general exclusions.

Note: In version 1.0.17, the excludePatterns setting was replaced with the more flexible exclude object. Please update your configuration accordingly.

🔍 Output Formats

1. Plaintext: A simple text format with clear sections for project structure (if enabled) and file contents.
2. Markdown: A formatted markdown output with code blocks for project structure (if enabled) and file contents.
3. XML: A structured XML format with separate sections for project structure and file contents.