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Up Your VS Code Game with Workspaces

-> 2 min read

VS Code's Workspaces allow you to customise both the UI and functionality of the IDE at a project level. Workspaces settings override User Settings and are useful for sharing project settings with other devs and allow for project specific functionality and customisation.

To open Workspace Settings use the shortcut Ctrl + ,. You can either edit the settings using the UI on this view or click the { } in the top right corner to edit the JSON file.

What are they good for?

  • Adjusting titleBar colors to differentiate between multiple projects.
  • search.exclude to hide dist / plugins / vendor / node_modules folders from search results.
  • Exportable config allows sharing with co-workers on a per project basis.
  • Multiple folder paths on one project (handy if frontend and backend live in separate repositories)
json
"folders": [
  {
    "path": "C:\\laragon\\www\\backend_server"
  },
  {
    "path": "C:\\Github\\front_end_ui"
  }
],

My Workspace Starter Settings

This is what I copy in to when I spool up a new project as a base - Gist

json
{
  "folders": [
    {
      "path": "C:\\Github\\PROJECT_NAME"
    }
  ],
  "settings": {
    "workbench.colorCustomizations": {
      "titleBar.activeBackground": "#141414",
      "titleBar.activeForeground": "#FFC87F",
      "titleBar.inactiveBackground": "#696969",
      "titleBar.inactiveForeground": "#FFC87F",
      "sash.hoverBorder": "#FFC87F"
    },
    "search.exclude": {
      ".cache": true,
      ".vscode": true,
      "node_modules": true
    },
    "window.title": "${rootName}",
    "editor.cursorSmoothCaretAnimation": true
  }
}

So what do you use?

What other handy settings should other developers be using with their workspaces?

References

User and Workspace Settings