Explorer Utils

Table of Contents

• About
• Getting Started
• Features
• Contributing

About

The "Explorer Utils" extension provides a set of utilities to enhance the VS Code Explorer. It adds several commands to the context menu and two convenient indicators to the status bar. It allows users to quickly add files/folders to .gitignore, toggle the visibility of .gitignore files, hide specific files or folders, toggle the visibility of all hidden files, and clear predefined "garbage" files or folders from the workspace.

Getting Started

These instructions will get you a copy of the project up and running on your local machine for development and testing purposes.

Prerequisites

You will need Node.js (which includes npm) and Visual Studio Code installed on your system.

Installing

1. Clone the repository:

   git clone https://github.com/amburgao/explorer-utils.git
   cd explorer-utils
   

2. Install dependencies:

   npm install
   

3. Compile the TypeScript source code:

   npm run compile
   

   Alternatively, you can run npm run watch to automatically recompile on file changes.

4. Run the extension in a development host: Open the project in VS Code and press F5. This will open a new VS Code window with the "Explorer Utils" extension activated.

Features

Explorer Context Menu Commands

The extension adds several commands to the Explorer context menu (right-click on a file or folder):

• Add to .gitignore: Adds the selected file or folder's relative path to the workspace's .gitignore file. If no .gitignore exists, it will prompt you to create one.
• Toggle .gitignore: Toggles the explorer.excludeGitIgnore setting, which controls whether files ignored by Git are hidden in the Explorer.
• Hide file/folder: Adds the selected file or folder's relative path to the files.exclude setting, effectively hiding it from the Explorer.
• Toggle hidden files: Toggles the visibility of all files and folders configured in the files.exclude setting.
• Clear workspace garbage: Deletes files and folders specified in the explorerUtils.garbageList configuration setting.

Status Bar Indicators

The extension adds two indicators to the right side of the status bar for quick access and visibility:

• .gitignore Status: Toggles the visibility of files ignored by Git.
  • $(eye) .gitignore Visible: Files in .gitignore are currently visible. Click to hide them.
  • $(eye-closed) .gitignore Excluded: Files in .gitignore are currently hidden. Click to show them.
• Hidden Files Status: Toggles the visibility of all files defined in the files.exclude setting.
  • $(eye) Hidden files Visible: Your hidden files are currently visible. Click to hide them.
  • $(eye-closed) Hidden files Excluded: Your hidden files are currently hidden. Click to show them.

Configuration

You can configure the list of items to be cleared by the "Clear workspace garbage" command in your VS Code settings (.vscode/settings.json):

// filepath: .vscode/settings.json
{
    "explorerUtils.garbageList": [
        "node_modules",
        "out",
        "dist"
    ]
}