VibeMol for VSCode

A VSCode extension that brings VibeMol — the molecular visualization and editing tool — directly into the editor. View and interact with .xyz, .cube, .2ccube, .molden, .hess, vibrational sidecar JSON, and Psi4 output files without leaving VSCode.

Installation

From the VS Code Marketplace

Search for VibeMol in the Extensions panel (Cmd+Shift+X) and click Install.

From source (local build)

Prerequisite: Node.js 20 or newer

# From the vibemol repo root
cd src/vscode_ext/vibemol
npm install
npm run package

Then install the generated .vsix:

Option A — Terminal:

code --install-extension vibemol-*.vsix

Option B — VSCode UI:

1. Open the Extensions panel (Cmd+Shift+X)
2. Click the ... menu → Install from VSIX...
3. Select the vibemol-*.vsix file

Option C — Command Palette:

1. Press Cmd+Shift+P
2. Type Install from VSIX
3. Select the vibemol-*.vsix file

Usage

Opening files

Any supported file opened in VSCode will automatically use VibeMol as the default viewer. You can also:

• Right-click a file in the Explorer → Open in VibeMol
• For .dat / .out files: right-click → Open With... → VibeMol

Drag and drop

Hold Shift while dragging files into the VibeMol panel to load them. Multiple files can be dropped at once and will be added to the current session.

Launch a blank viewer

Open the Command Palette (Cmd+Shift+P) and run Launch VibeMol Webview, or click the VibeMol icon in the editor toolbar (top right).

Supported File Types

Keyboard Shortcuts

Requirements

• VSCode ^1.118.0
• No other dependencies — the extension is fully self-contained