Poetic Motivator VS Code Extension README

Poetic Motivator brings lines of poetry into your editor as you code. Every few lines you type (you choose the cadence), a new line of poetry appears to keep you motivated and inspired.

Features

• Inline poetry: See lines of poetry appear next to your code as you type

• Subtle status bar display mode option

• Custom cadence: control how often new lines appear

• Full poem view: read the complete poem at any time

• History panel: revisit previously shown poems

• Skip option: skip a poem that isn't to your liking

• Adjustable styling: light, medium, or dark display intensity

• Choose out of 129 authors, or randomize the poetry selection

How it works

1. Start typing in any file
2. After a set number of lines (three by default), a poem line appears
3. Continue coding to reveal more lines
4. Finish a poem, automatically move to the next
5. Don't like a poem? Skip it through the hover link (inline) or quick pick (status bar)

Commands

Access via Command Palette (Cmd/Ctrl + Shift + P), status bar, or hover links (inline view only):

• Poetic Motivator: Show Full Poem
• Poetic Motivator: Skip Poem
• Poetic Motivator: View History
• Poetic Motivator: Toggle

Settings

Customize in VS Code Settings:

Display Location: poeticMotivator.displayLocation

• inline — Show poetry beside your code (default)
• status bar — Show poetry in the status bar

Cadence: poeticMotivator.cadence

• Number of lines typed before the next poetry line appears (3 is default)

Color: poeticMotivator.color

• light — subtle
• medium — balanced (default)
• dark — high contrast (against white)

Author: poeticMotivator.author

• Choose a specific poet or get random poems from any author (default)

Enabled: poeticMotivator.enabled

• turn the extension on or off

Notes

• Poetry is fetched from an external API (PoetryDB)
• If the service is unavailable, cached poems are used instead
• A loading indicator appears while poems are being fetched
• This extension uses onStartupFinished because it listens to typing globally. It can be turned off in extension settings (poeticMotivator.enabled)

Roadmap

• Persist history across sessions
• Screen reader support with information messages
• Better keyboard support
• More display customization

Release Notes

Users appreciate release notes as you update your extension.

0.0.1

Initial release of Poetic Motivator

License

MIT License

Copyright (c) 2026 Luke Kudryashov

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.

Attribution

Storytelling icon created by Victoruler - Flaticon