VS Code Keybindings
It’s worth your time to get to know the keyboard shortcuts for whatever editor you use. We’ve gone a step further and added some custom keybindings for some of the commands we use most.
Open your Keyboard Shortcuts from the menu (Code > Preferences > Keyboard Shortcuts) or by using (what else?) the keyboard shortcut (⌘+K, ⌘+S). From there, you can see all of the current keyboard shortcuts and customize them.
For serious customization, click the link to open keybindings.js. That opens two panes: the default keybindings, and your custom bindings. My keybindings appear below. I’ll talk about a few of them.
// Place your key bindings in this file to overwrite the defaults
[
{
"key": "alt+cmd+.",
"command": "editor.emmet.action.matchingPair"
},
{
"key": "shift+cmd+a",
"command": "editor.emmet.action.wrapWithAbbreviation"
},
{
"key": "cmd+'",
"command": "esQuotes.transformBetweenSingleDoubleQuotes"
},
{
"key": "ctrl+space",
"command": "editor.emmet.action.expandAbbreviation",
"when": "editorTextFocus && !editorHasMultipleSelections && !editorHasSelection && !editorReadonly"
},
{
"key": "ctrl+shift+space",
"command": "editor.emmet.action.splitJoinTag",
"when": "editorTextFocus && !editorHasMultipleSelections && !editorHasSelection && !editorReadonly"
},
{
"key": "ctrl+k ctrl+e",
"command": "extension.embraceParenthesis",
"when": "editorHasSelection && editorTextFocus"
},
{
"key": "ctrl+k ctrl+[",
"command": "extension.embraceSquareBrackets",
"when": "editorHasSelection && editorTextFocus"
},
{
"key": "ctrl+k ctrl+l",
"command": "extension.embraceCurlyBrackets",
"when": "editorHasSelection && editorTextFocus"
},
{
"key": "ctrl+k ctrl+a",
"command": "extension.embraceAngleBrackets",
"when": "editorHasSelection && editorTextFocus"
},
{
"key": "ctrl+k ctrl+'",
"command": "extension.embraceSingleQuotes",
"when": "editorHasSelection && editorTextFocus"
},
{
"key": "ctrl+k ctrl+o",
"command": "extension.embraceDoubleQuotes",
"when": "editorHasSelection && editorTextFocus"
}
]
Emmet is a wonderful tool for expanding CSS selector-like snippets into HTML elements. For example, type .container>.row>.col-xs-12>p, and Emmet will expand it into this:
<div class="container">
<div class="row">
<div class="col-xs-12">
<p></p>
</div>
</div>
</div>
It will even put your cursor inside the <p></p> tags. And if you use it within JSX, it will use className instead of class, just as it should.
By default, IntelliSense will suggest Emmet expansion just like any other autocompletion. Sometimes that’s fine, but other times it can be a real pain in the neck. Thus, I prefer to set a custom shortcut: ctrl+space.
When Emmet expands an abbreviation for a React component, it adds both a closing and opening tag. Sometimes, we just want a single, self-closing tag. In the keybindings listed in the previous section, we added one for "editor.emmet.action.splitJoinTag". This toggles between the open / closing tag and self-closing tag by pressing ctrl+shift+space
There’s another really handy Emmet feature to which I’ve assigned a shortcut: wrap with abbreviation. It allows you to wrap a selection inside an HTML element identified by an Emmet abbreviation. Select the text you want to wrap and hit the shortcut. You’ll be presented with a box to type the abbreviation into. Magic! I’ve assigned this command to shift+⌘+A.
To make sure Emmet will work with JSX files suffixed with .js, add the following lines to your VSCode settings (Code > Preferences > Settings):
"emmet.syntaxProfiles": {
"javascript": "jsx"
}
I mentioned the ECMAScript Quotes Transformer extension earlier. This begs for a keyboard shortcut to quickly switch between single and double quotes: ⌘+‘.
As mentioned on the previous page, the Embrace extension does not assign any keybindings by default, so I configured some. My shortcuts vary slightly from the recommended shortcuts on the extension’s page (in particular, I prefer ctrl+K, ctrl+[ for wrapping with square brackets).