Glob Hide Files

Hide any file matching a glob (or a list of globs), and toggle them back into view from the command palette.

Under the hood this manages entries in files.exclude, so hidden files disappear from the Explorer, quick open, and search — but only the entries Glob Hide Files added are ever touched. Anything you put in files.exclude yourself is left alone, including when you toggle back.

By default those entries go in your user settings, so nothing is written into the project and no git-tracked file changes. See Where settings are written if you want to scope hiding to a single project instead.

Configuration

{
  "globHideFiles.patterns": [
    "**/*.lock",
    "**/*.generated.ts",
    "dist"
  ]
}

Commands

The status bar item (right side) shows the current state and toggles on click.

Where settings are written

globHideFiles.configurationTarget controls which settings file the generated files.exclude entries land in.

global (default) — writes to your user settings. Nothing is written into the project, so opening a repo with this extension never produces a git diff. The tradeoff is that files.exclude is shared across windows: if two projects are open with different globHideFiles.patterns, the most recently activated window wins and the other stops hiding until you toggle it again. Your own files.exclude entries are never damaged either way. If you use one set of patterns everywhere, put globHideFiles.patterns in user settings too and this never comes up.

workspace — writes to the project's .vscode/settings.json (or the .code-workspace file), so hiding is scoped to that project and windows never interfere. Note that these files are usually tracked by git, so expect a diff; add .vscode/settings.json to .gitignore or .git/info/exclude if that's unwanted.

Switching between the two migrates cleanly — entries left in the old location are removed automatically, even if the switch happens across sessions.

Notes

• Editing globHideFiles.patterns while files are hidden takes effect immediately — removed patterns are unexcluded, new ones are hidden.
• If a pattern is already set to true in your own files.exclude, Hide Files leaves it there and will not remove it when you toggle back.
• The hidden state persists across reloads. Uninstalling while hidden leaves the files.exclude entries behind; run Glob Hide Files: Show Matching Files first to clean them up.
• Running the extension from the Extension Development Host uses the same settings as a normal install, so the default global target keeps the folder you're testing against free of stray changes.

Development

npm install
npm run watch   # then press F5 to launch the Extension Development Host

Releasing

Releases are cut by the Release workflow, dispatched manually from the Actions tab with a version bump type (major / minor / patch). The workflow derives the new version from the latest v* tag on the remote, so git tags are the source of truth — the version field in package.json stays at 0.0.0 and is stamped at build time.

The run packages a single .vsix, publishes that exact file to the Marketplace, and attaches it to a GitHub release tagged v<version>. Tick dry-run to build and validate the package without publishing or tagging.

Required repository secret: