Anchronos

Never lose your multi-cursors again.

Freeze your cursors in time, roam freely through your code, and release them all at once.

The Problem

You're using Ctrl+D to build up multiple cursors across a file. Everything is going great — until you need to also grab a position three hundred lines away, or one that has a slightly different name. The moment you click or arrow away, all your cursors are gone.

Anchronos solves this. It lets you freeze your cursor positions into anchors, travel anywhere in the file with a single free cursor, plant more anchors along the way, and then unfreeze — materializing every anchor simultaneously as real VS Code multi-cursors.

Demo

How It Works

Anchronos has two modes:

Use Cases

Renaming inconsistent variables

A file where three developers used three different names for the same concept. Ctrl+D won't help because the names don't match.

function getUserData(userId: string) {
  const userResult = fetchUser(userId);
  return userResult;
}

function getMemberProfile(memberId: string) {
  const memberResult = fetchMember(memberId);
  return memberResult;
}

function getAccountInfo(accountId: string) {
  const accountResult = fetchAccount(accountId);
  return accountResult;
}

Flow: Ctrl+D on userId → Alt+L to freeze → navigate to memberId → Alt+A → navigate to accountId → Alt+A → Alt+L to release → type profileId. All three update at once.

Adding a namespace prefix to selective imports

You want to prefix specific imports but skip others in between.

import { Button } from "./components";
import { Modal } from "./components";
import { Input } from "./components";
import { Dropdown } from "./components";
import { Helper } from "./utils"; // skip this one
import { Tooltip } from "./components";

Flow: Freeze on the first four { from ./components → navigate to the last one skipping ./utils → Alt+A → Alt+L → type UI.. Five imports updated, one untouched.

Inserting debug lines at the start of specific functions

You want to add a console.log at the top of three functions but not all of them.

function calculatePrice(items) {
  return items.reduce((sum, item) => sum + item.price, 0);
}

function applyDiscount(price, code) {
  return price * discountMap[code];
}

function formatCurrency(amount) {
  // skip this one
  return `$${amount.toFixed(2)}`;
}

function calculateTax(price, region) {
  return price * taxRates[region];
}

Flow: Freeze at the start of line 2 Alt+L → navigate to line 6 → Alt+A → navigate to line 14 → Alt+A → Alt+L → type console.log('called');. Three functions instrumented, one skipped.

Keybindings

Commands

All commands are available via the Command Palette (Ctrl+Shift+P):

Settings

How Anchors Stay Accurate

Anchronos stores cursor positions as absolute character offsets rather than line/column pairs. When you type or delete text before an anchor, the extension automatically shifts its offset to compensate — no manual recalculation needed.

Two additional rules keep the timeline clean:

• Butterfly Effect — if you delete the exact text where an anchor sits, that anchor is removed automatically.
• Paradox Unification — if two anchors collide on the same offset after an edit, they merge into one.

Each File Is Independent

Freezing time in one file does not affect any other open tab. You can have multiple files frozen simultaneously with their own independent anchor sets.

License

MIT