Settings editor is awesome - could make it available to user projects

[chsasank]

Settings UI and the backend json is awesome. It's simple and the paradigm is very generic. It could be used for managing config/settings of other projects. Eg. settings of Windows Terminal

This whole paradigm could be made generic, documented and UI could be made available to other projects.

[roblourens]

It's not actually generic, it's tightly tied to vscode's settings model.

[chsasank]

vscode's settings model - the backend and frontend - is fairly generic. Configuration and settings are a necessity for every application out there. But good UX for settings is a rarity. vscode solved this UX issue and I propose this solution could be made available to other apps.

1. Users could use vscode settings model (i.e. documented jsons) for their own projects. Say, instead of environment variables which are quite fickle IMO.
2. If some key of json is present (say like schema), vscode could interpret these jsons and open UI for editing these jsons
3. Taking 1 and 2 to extreme, settings model and UI could be separated out into a package which could be reused by other apps. I understand that this is more work.

I hope this makes my proposal clearer. I must admit I don't understand the internals of vscode very well - I'm a python dev.

I can understand that the settings-editor code is tightly coupled to vscode, but the paradigm is not, IMO. I can't but appreciate your settings module and wish it is available for my project.

[roblourens]

Thanks for the idea but what you are proposing isn't a feature request, it's like a new product request. The code is tightly coupled to vscode and there is a lot of it. It's not a generic json schema editor, it's optimized for vscode's extensions of this and the subset that we use. Someone else is welcome to do the huge refactoring necessary to make this useful for other products but I think it might be faster to start over.

[chsasank]

Thanks for the idea but what you are proposing isn't a feature request, it's like a new product request

I agree!

Someone else is welcome to do the huge refactoring necessary to make this useful for other products but I think it might be faster to start over.

I think you're right about this. Starting over is easier. Would you be able to point me to the current code for settings editor and its backend. It'll help me and others whoever is interested in such a project. Thanks!

[yume-chan]

Many times, parts of Code are so good, but too tightly coupled with other parts to be extracted or reused.

[roblourens]

You can find the file settingsEditor2.ts and start from there.

[chsasank]

Thanks!