Playful Sparkle: Dev Toolbox

Playful Sparkle Dev Toolbox is your all-in-one solution within Visual Studio Code for URL slug generation, Base64/URL encoding/decoding, GUID generation, and removing empty lines, non-printable characters, and whitespace. This extension streamlines common text manipulation tasks directly in your editor, boosting your productivity without the need for external tools.

Seamlessly integrate these essential features into your coding environment to simplify text processing and generation. Whether you're optimizing URLs, handling data encoding, generating unique IDs, or cleaning up text, Playful Sparkle Dev Toolbox provides efficient and reliable tools at your fingertips.

Features

• Text Case Conversion Commands: Easily convert selected text into various common programming case formats:
  • Camel case - lowercase first word, uppercase subsequent words (e.g., myVariableName)
  • Pascal case - each word starts with an uppercase letter (e.g., MyClassName)
  • Snake case - words separated by underscores, all lowercase (e.g., my_variable_name)
  • Screaming snake case - words separated by underscores, all uppercase (e.g., MY_CONSTANT_NAME)
  • Kebab case - words separated by hyphens, all lowercase (e.g., my-variable-name)
  • Train case - words separated by hyphens, all uppercase (e.g., MY-VARIABLE-NAME)
  • Flat case - all words joined without separators, all lowercase (e.g., myvariablename)
  • Uppercase - all characters uppercase without separators (e.g., MYVARIABLENAME)
• Safe Locale-Aware Case Conversion: Provides safeToLowerCase and safeToUppercase functions that attempt to use locale-specific case conversion via toLocaleLowerCase and toLocaleUpperCase. Includes a robust fallback to standard toLowerCase and toUpperCase to ensure consistent behavior across different environments. Allows for optional locale parameters to handle language-specific case conversion rules.
• Intelligent Slugification: Offers a slugify function that converts strings into URL-friendly slugs; removes diacritics, special characters, and replaces spaces with hyphens. Attempts to preserve file extensions during slugification, intelligently differentiating between file extensions and other dot-separated text.
• Base64 Encoding/Decoding: Implements base64Encode and base64Decode functions for seamless Base64 encoding and decoding of strings.
• URL Encoding/Decoding: Provides urlEncode and urlDecode functions for encoding and decoding strings for use in URLs.
• GUID Generation: Generates Globally Unique Identifiers (GUIDs) with the following formatting options:
  • Raw format: xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx (e.g., a1b2c3d4-e5f6-7890-9abc-c1d2e3f4a5b6)
  • Registry format: {xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx} (e.g., {a1b2c3d4-e5f6-7890-9abc-c1d2e3f4a5b6})
  • Square brackets format: [Guid("xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx")] (e.g., [Guid("a1b2c3d4-e5f6-7890-9abc-c1d2e3f4a5b6")])
  • Less than sign format: <Guid("xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx")> (e.g., <Guid("a1b2c3d4-e5f6-7890-9abc-c1d2e3f4a5b6")>)
• Remove Empty Lines: Provides functionality to remove empty lines from text with the following options:
  • When true, removes all empty lines.
  • When false, only removes consecutive empty lines, keeping single empty lines intact.
  • Considers lines with only whitespace (spaces, tabs) as empty when true.
  • Only removes completely empty lines when false.
• Remove Non-Printable Characters: Removes characters that are not typically intended for printing or display.
• Remove Leading and Trailing Whitespace: Trims whitespace (spaces, tabs, newlines) from the beginning and end of strings.
• Named HTML Entities: Converts applicable characters to their corresponding named HTML entity representation (e.g., <> to <>, é to é) and reverses the process, transforming named HTML entities back into their original character form (e.g., " to ").
• HTML Hex Entities: Encodes characters using their hexadecimal Unicode code point representation in the HTML entity format (e.g., !ü🔥 to !ü🔥) and interprets/converts HTML hexadecimal entities back to their original characters (e.g., A to A).
• HTML Decimal Entities: Encodes characters using their decimal Unicode code point representation in the HTML entity format (e.g., "à👍 to "à👍) and converts HTML decimal entities back to their corresponding characters (e.g., a to a).
• JavaScript Unicode Escape Sequences: Transforms characters into their JavaScript-style Unicode escape sequence representation (e.g., \uXXXX or \UXXXXXXXX, like $ñ✨ to $\u00F1\u2728) and parses/converts these escape sequences back to their original characters (e.g., \u00E9 to é).
• CSS Unicode Escape Sequences: Encodes characters into the format used within CSS (e.g., \XXXXXX, like #ô❤️ to #\00F4 \2764 \FE0F ) and interprets/converts these escape sequences back to their original characters (e.g., \0042 to B).
• Unicode Code Points: Represents characters using the standard Unicode code point notation (e.g., U+XXXX, like %ç🤔 to U+0025 U+00E7 U+1F914) and converts strings in this format back to their corresponding Unicode characters (e.g., U+0043 to C).
• ES6 Unicode Code Point Escape Sequences: Encodes characters using the ECMAScript 6 (ES6) specific format (e.g., \u{XXXXXX}, like &á🚀 to &\u{E1}\u{1F680}) and parses/converts these escape sequences back to their original characters (e.g., \u{61} to a).
• Extended Hex Escape Sequences: Encodes characters using extended hexadecimal escape sequences (e.g., \x{XXXXXX}, like 'å😂 to \x{E5}\x{1F602}) and converts these escape sequences back to their corresponding characters (e.g., \x{44} to D).
• Hex Code Points: Represents characters using their hexadecimal code point value (e.g., 0xXXXX, like (è🎉 to 0x28 0xE8 0x1F389) and converts these hexadecimal code point strings back to their corresponding characters (e.g., 0x65 to e).
• Multi-Language Support: The extension's user interface and informational messages are available in English (en), Magyar (hu), Slovenčina (sk), Čeština (cs), Deutsch (de), Français (fr), Polski (pl), Български (bg), Español (es), Italiano (it), 日本語 (ja), 한국어 (ko), Português do Brasil (pt-br), Русский (ru), Türkçe (tr), 简体中文 (zh-cn), 繁體中文 (zh-tw) languages.

Requirements

This extension has no special requirements or dependencies. It works directly within Visual Studio Code.

Known Issues

• Locale-Specific Case Conversion Inconsistencies:

  • The safeToLowerCase and safeToUppercase functions rely on toLocaleLowerCase and toLocaleUpperCase, respectively, which can exhibit inconsistencies across different JavaScript environments and operating systems. This can lead to unexpected results when converting text with locale-specific rules.
  • While a fallback to toLowerCase and toUpperCase is implemented, this fallback might not provide the desired locale-specific behavior, potentially resulting in incorrect case conversions for certain languages.
  • When using locale parameters, it is possible that some environments do not contain the locale data, causing the function to fail.

• Slugification Limitations with Complex File Names:

  • The slugify function attempts to preserve file extensions but might not handle all edge cases correctly. For instance, file names with multiple dots or unusual extension patterns could lead to unintended slugification outcomes.
  • The function's reliance on regular expressions for character removal and replacement might not cover all possible non-alphanumeric characters, potentially leaving some unwanted characters in the slugified output.

• GUID Generation Predictability:

  • The generateGuid function uses Math.random() for GUID generation, which is not cryptographically secure. While suitable for most general-purpose use cases, it should not be used for applications requiring high levels of security or uniqueness.
  • While the GUID generated is very unlikely to be the same, there is still a very small risk of collision.

If you encounter any of these or other issues, please report them on the GitHub Issues page with detailed steps to reproduce the problem.

Release Notes

0.0.11

Introduced a streamlined issue reporting mechanism in alignment with Microsoft Visual Studio Code extension development best practices. This enhancement allows users to report bugs, suggest features, and provide feedback more efficiently, improving overall user experience and support responsiveness.

0.0.10

• Updated the logic for removing non-printable characters. Most control characters and specific invisible whitespace are now replaced with a space. Standard whitespace (tab, line feed, carriage return) is preserved, as are zero-width joiners/non-joiners and variation selectors when they are part of character sequences.

0.0.9

• Introduced a suite of commands to easily convert selected text to various common programming case formats like camelCase (e.g., myVariableName), PascalCase (e.g., MyClassName), snake_case (e.g., my_variable_name), SCREAMING_SNAKE_CASE (e.g., MY_CONSTANT_NAME), kebab-case (e.g., my-variable-name), TRAIN-CASE (e.g., MY-VARIABLE-NAME), flatcase (e.g., myvariablename), UPPERCASE (e.g., MYVARIABLENAME)

0.0.8

The updated removal of non-printable characters now neutralizes hidden control characters (e.g., null bytes, zero-width spaces), maintains complex character sequences (emojis, diacritics, joined scripts) while stripping broken/invalid Unicode artifacts, eliminates potential injection vectors from malformed surrogate pairs and invisible formatting characters, and guarantees output contains only standardized, renderable characters per Unicode 15.0 specifications.

0.0.7

• Updated encode/decode named HTML entity, encode/decode HTML hex entity, encode/decode decimal entity, encode/decode JavaScript unicode escape, encode/decode CSS unicode escape, encode/decode code point, encode ES6 unicode code point escape, encode/decode extended hex escape and encode/decode hex code point now work using multi cursor.

0.0.6

• Added support for three new GUID formats.
• Introduced support for the following character encoding and decoding schemes.

0.0.5

• The extension's icon color theme has been updated, providing a more polished and consistent look.
• The extension description has been refined to be more clear, concise, and easier for new users to understand its features and benefits.

0.0.4

• Remove Empty Lines from Document.
• Remove Empty Lines from Selection.

0.0.3

• Re-upload, package was not updated properly.

0.0.2

• Removes empty lines from the selected text.
• Removes non-printable characters from the selected text.
• Removes whitespace (spaces, tabs, newlines) from the beginning and end of the selected text.

0.0.1

• Locale-Aware Case Conversion.
• URL-Friendly Slug Generation.
• Base64 Encoding/Decoding.
• URL Encoding/Decoding.
• GUID Generation.

Support

For any inquiries, bug reports, or feature requests related to the Playful Sparkle: Dev Toolbox extension, please feel free to utilize the following channels:

• GitHub Issues: For bug reports, feature suggestions, or technical discussions, please open a new issue on the GitHub repository. This allows for community visibility and tracking of reported issues.
• Email Support: For general questions or private inquiries, you can contact the developer directly via email at support@playfulsparkle.com. Please allow a reasonable timeframe for a response.

We encourage users to use the GitHub Issues page for bug reports and feature requests as it helps in better organization and tracking of the extension's development.

License

This extension is licensed under the BSD-3-Clause License. See the LICENSE file for complete details.

Author

Hi! We're the team behind Playful Sparkle, a creative agency from Slovakia. We got started way back in 2004 and have been having fun building digital solutions ever since. Whether it's crafting a brand, designing a website, developing an app, or anything in between, we're all about delivering great results with a smile. We hope you enjoy using our Visual Studio Code extension!