The VSCode has rocketed its way to one of the top development IDEs due to its fresh look, usability, tons of feature sets, and customization options besides being very lightweight. But such extensive customization options at times do overwhelm the user and sometimes make it a tedious task to find the precise customization option to tweak to meet your goals.

Though the VSCode team has done an excellent job by introducing the ‘command palette’ (Ctrl+Shift+P), which indeed makes it very easy to find almost anything that VSCode has to offer, however, in order to make use of ‘command palette’ you still need to know the precise ‘keyword’ to search. I recently encountered one such problem and despite the ‘command palette’, I had to scan through several settings, eventually locating the solution.

1. Problem Description

I noticed whenever I opened any file in VSCode, it used to open the file in the already opened tab of the editor. Every time I clicked on any file to open it would replace the previously opened file with the new file in the same tab rather than opening the new file in a new tab. Because of this, I not only used to lose the previously opened file but was also stuck with a single tab.

My investigation revealed that this was happening due to the VSCode editor’s feature called ‘Preview Mode’. This mode is enabled by default and you can easily identify that you are opening the editor tab in ‘Preview Mode’ by noticing that the tab name is written in ‘italicized’ letters, as shown below.

Hence if you see your editor tab name is ‘italicized’ that means you are viewing in ‘Preview Mode’. This is the reason you are not able to open new

2. What is Preview Mode and Why?

I guess the problem description in the above section duly explains what is ‘Preview Mode’, so the next question arises, why? At the onset, it may seem an annoying feature and one may even assume that reason behind having this enabled by default must be a bug or design issue in VSCode release. However this is not the case and In fact, most likely this is a deliberately designed feature introduced for optimizing the user experience or even performance.

Consider the example, where a developer might click on a number of files to view/read the code or maybe during debugging but eventually ends up working on just a single file. This is a very usual scenario and may happen repeatedly and frequently. But this also means that the developer would have opened a lot of files (and hence tabs) during the course of work. Obviously, this would clutter the view of the editor gradually decreasing the usability or even efficiency. Hence the ‘Preview Mode’!

3. Open Files in New Tab While in Preview Mode

While in ‘Preview Mode’, you can still open files in a new tab. Given below are a couple of ways you can do this:

3.1. Open Files Using Double-Click

You can use the double click to open each successive file. Using double click the successive files would open in a new tab while retaining the existing tabs.

3.2. Right-Click Tab Options (Keep Open)

Another way to keep the existing ‘Preview Mode’ tab open is by right-clicking on the ‘Preview Mode’ tab and selecting the option called ‘Keep Open’ from right-click context menu.

3.3. Double-Click the Tab

If the tab you are working on is already open in ‘Preview Mode’ and you want this tab to remain open then you can do so by simply double-clicking on the tab. Doing so would make the tab to lose ‘Preview Mode’ and next time when you click on another file, that file would open in a new tab.

4. Set VSCode To Always Open Files in New Tab

If you are not a big fan of ‘Preview Mode’ and you want to permanently get rid of this feature, you can turn this feature off. Once the ‘Preview Mode’ is turned off, every file you open would open in a new tab. Here are couple of ways you can achieve this.

4.1 VSCode Settings UI

You can turn off ‘Preview Mode’ via the VSCode settings UI. To do so, open VSCode settings and search for ‘enable preview’. Locate the two settings named the following:

Workbench › Editor: Enable Preview
Workbench › Editor: Enable Preview from Quick Open

 Uncheck both the settings and this would disable the ‘Preview Mode’.

4.2 VSCode Settings Json

Finally, if you prefer to turn off ‘Preview Mode’ via modifying the settings.json for the user. Open the settings.json and look for the following two keys and set their value to ‘false’ as shown below:

"workbench.editor.enablePreview": false,
"workbench.editor.enablePreviewFromQuickOpen": false

The post How To Always Open Files in New Tab in VSCode appeared first on Automation Dojos.

One of the common use cases for accessing Git repositories on Github is authentication via SSH keys. This offers a secure way of working with Github repositories using SSH protocol.

If you use Eclipse IDE for development and want to use the same for Git workflows like ‘commit’, ‘pull’, ‘push’ etc. you can easily do so by installing one of the Git plugins for Eclipse for example ‘EGit’. By default Eclipse (EGit) would prompt you for username/password while doing Git workflows like ‘push’, you also have the option to save your Git credentials within Eclipse so you don’t have to provide your credentials every time.

However, if you use SSH keys for Git workflows rather than username/password, here is how you can add SSH keys to Eclipse so Eclipse does not prompt you for credentials while doing Git workflows.

Open Eclipse Preferences

Open the Eclipse Preferences via Window > Preferences

Navigate to SSH Preferences

Now type in ‘SSH’ in the search box on the ‘Preferences’ window

Open General SSH2 Settings

Click on ‘SSH’ under, General > Network Connections > SSH2 and open Tab named ‘General’

Set SSH Home Location

On the SSH preferences window, check that you have correctly set your ‘SSH2 Home’ location (path).

Assuming you have local Git installation on your system, the standard path to .ssh home would usually be ‘.ssh’ folder in the user home directory e.g <userhome>/<.ssh>

In case you store your keys somewhere else other than the standard SSH home then you can specify that location as path to SSH home.

Set SSH Private Key/s

While on the SSH window, now click on the ‘Add Private Key’ button and browse to the location of your SSH private key and select your SSH key.

You can specify/load multiple SSH keys using this window separated by commas.

Click Apply to save your changes.

Set/Verify Authentication Method

Next, while on the SSH preferences window, select the tab named ‘Authentication Methods’ and make sure you select/check the ‘publickey’ option. Click Apply to save your changes.

Optional: Save SSH Key ‘Passphrase’ in Secure Store

If you have a ‘passphrase’ (password) set on your SSH key then you also have the option to save your passphrase in Secure Store using Eclipse. If you save your passphrase using this option then Eclipse would not prompt you for a passphrase while doing Git workflows.

For storing your passphrase within Eclipse Secure Store, type ‘Git’ in the search box on the ‘Preferences’ window and navigate to Version Control (Team) > Git and select (check) the option ‘Store SSH Key Passphrase in secure store’

Click Apply and Close to save your changes. DONE!

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This article shows how to change the Package Explorer text size and style.

The font used for tree and table views can now be customized with a font preference. This preference is called “Tree and Table font for views” and can be found in Window > Preferences > General > Appearance > Colors and Fonts under the “View and Editor Folders” category.

Open Eclipse Preferences

Open the Eclipse Preferences via Window > Preferences

Navigate to Colors and Fonts

Navigate to ‘Colors and Fonts’ on the left-hand side preferences tree view

View and Editor Folders Settings

On the right-hand side pane, scroll and locate ‘View and Editor Folders’

Tree and Table Font Views

Scroll down to ‘Tree and Table Font Views’ under ‘View and Editor Folders’

Edit and Set Desired font and styling

Click Apply and Close to Save your Settings. DONE!

Re-launch the Eclipse if your changes are not visible.

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IntelliJ Quick Documentation

So how do you generally refer your Java API Doc? If you use Google or online Java API Doc or even a locally downloaded copy then here is a better way, why not view the JavaDoc hints within IntelliJ editor itself. The article below shows the quick and easy procedure to do this, interested? keep reading.

Provided you are using Java SDK, In IntelliJ IDEA, you can view Java API Doc (SDK) for any symbol or method signature right from the editor via IntelliJ feature also called ‘Quick Documentation’ which you can invoke via keyboard shortcut Ctrl+Q

This feature should be enabled by default, if not here is how to enable it.

Enabling IntelliJ ‘Quick Documentation’

Open IntelliJ Settings

Launch the IntelliJ settings by navigating to [File | Settings]

Enable ‘Show documentation popup’

On the settings dialog box, navigate to [Editor | Code Completion] and enable the option ‘Show the documentation popup in 1000ms’ (Of course you can input whatever time value you wish) and click ‘Apply’

Enable ‘Documentation on mouse move’

While on settings dialog box again navigate to [Editor | General] and enable the option ‘Show quick documentation on mouse move’. Click ‘Apply’ and ‘OK’.

Validate your changes

Check by invoking the ‘Quick Documentation’ for any piece of code by pressing Ctrl+Q while in the editor

Enhance by adding documentation URL

You can add online java SDK documentation to your IntelliJ ‘project settings’ so that you can get more enhanced information about classes, symbols and method signatures etc.

Locate Javadoc online documentation

Locate the URL for your JavaDoc online. For example, the URL for Java 11 Java API Doc is – https://docs.oracle.com/en/java/javase/11/docs/api/index.html

Open ‘project settings’ dialog box

On IntelliJ, launch the project settings [File | Project Structure]

Open SDK documentation tab

On ‘project structure’ dialog box, click on ‘SDKs’ on right hand side column and then click on ‘Documentation Paths’ tab in right hand side pane

Add documentation path/url

Now add the documentation url. Click ‘Ok’ and save. That’s it!

Validate your changes

Check by invoking the ‘Quick Documentation’ for any piece of code by pressing Ctrl+Q while in the editor.

The post How to View Java API Doc Hints within IntelliJ appeared first on Automation Dojos.

IntelliJ Live Templates

Live templates let you insert frequently-used or custom code constructs into your source code file quickly and efficiently

IntelliJ IDEA comes with a set of predefined Live Templates. You can use them as-is, or modify them to suit your needs. If you want to create a new live template, you can do it from scratch, on the basis of the copy of an existing template, or from a fragment of source code. Live templates are stored in the following location:

Shortcut For ‘main’ Method

OPTION 1: In IntelliJ IDEA, type ‘psvm’ and press TAB to automatically generate a ‘main’ method

OPTION 2: You can also generate ‘main’ method by simply typing ‘main’ and then press TAB

View All Available Shortcuts

To view all default ‘Live Templates’ type Ctrl + J

You can also view, edit or create shortcuts from the settings. Navigate to File > Settings > Live Templates

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This article shows how to change the text size and style for the Eclipse editor pane.

The font used for Eclipse editor pane can be customized with font preference. This preference is located under “Basic” settings and can be found in Window > Preferences > General > Appearance > Colors and Fonts.

Open Eclipse Preferences

Open the Eclipse Preferences via Window > Preferences

Navigate to Colors and Fonts

Navigate to ‘Colors and Fonts’ on the left-hand side preferences tree view

Basic Color and Font Settings

On the right-hand side pane, scroll and locate ‘Basic’

Text Font Settings

Scroll down to ‘Text Font’ under ‘Basic’

Edit and Set Desired font and styling

Click Apply and Close to Save your Settings. DONE!

Re-launch the Eclipse if your changes are not visible.

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