Customizing your VSCode
Tags: vscode, tutorial, beginners
Published: 2023-02-12 03:54:01

Visual Studio Code (VSCode) is a popular source code editor that is highly customizable and has an extensive library of themes and extensions. Whether you're a beginner or an experienced developer, personalizing your coding environment can greatly improve your productivity and help you enjoy coding even more. In this blog post, we'll go over the steps to customize your VSCode theme and make it truly your own.

### Step 1: Installing a new theme
VSCode has a large collection of built-in themes, but you can also install new themes from the marketplace. To do this, click on the Extensions icon on the left-side menu, or press `Ctrl` + `Shift` + `X` on Windows or `Cmd` + `Shift` + `X` on Mac. Search for "themes" and browse the available options. Once you find a theme you like, click the Install button, and the theme will be added to your VSCode.

### Step 2: Activating a theme
Once you have installed a new theme, you can activate it by going to the File menu, selecting Preferences, and then Settings. Alternatively, you can press `Ctrl` + `,` on Windows or `Cmd` + `,` on Mac. In the search bar, type "color theme" and select the "Editor: Color Theme" option. From the drop-down menu, select the theme you just installed.

### Step 3: Customizing your theme
If you want to take your customization to the next level, you can create your own custom theme. To do this, go to the File menu, select Preferences, and then Settings. In the search bar, type "color theme" and select the "Editor: Color Theme" option. From the drop-down menu, select the "Edit in settings.json" option.

In the settings.json file, you can add or modify the color values for different syntax elements in your code, such as keywords, strings, and comments. To customize your theme, you can either use existing color values from other themes or specify your own hexadecimal codes.

Here are some examples of what you can edit in your settings.json file:
- Keyboard Shortcuts: You can modify the default keyboard shortcuts in VSCode by changing the keybindings. For example, to change the shortcut for opening the integrated terminal, add the following line to your settings.json file:

```
"keybindings": [
   {
       "key": "ctrl+`",
       "command": "workbench.action.terminal.toggleTerminal",
       "when": "terminalFocus"
   }
],
```

- Auto-saving: You can enable or disable the automatic saving of files in VSCode by modifying the files.autoSave setting. For example, to turn on auto-save, add the following line to your settings.json file:
```
"files.autoSave": "onFocusChange",
```

- Syntax highlighting: You can customize the syntax highlighting for different languages by adding the following lines to the settings.json file:
```
"editor.tokenColorCustomizations": {
  "comments": [
    { "color": "#606060" }
  ],
  "keywords": [
    { "color": "#0000FF" }
  ],
  "strings": [
    { "color": "#00FF00" }
  ],
  "numbers": [
    { "color": "#FF0000" }
  ]
}
```

- Line numbers: You can change the color of line numbers in the editor by adding the following line to the settings.json file: `"editor.lineNumbers.foreground": "#00FF00"`. Replace `#00FF00` with your preferred hex code.

- Selection color: You can change the background color of selected text by adding the following line to the settings.json file: `"editor.selectionBackground": "#FFD700"`. Replace `#FFD700` with your preferred hex code.

These are just a few examples of the color customizations you can make in the settings.json file. You can find a complete list of customization options in the Visual Studio Code documentation.

### Step 4: Saving your theme
Once you have made your changes, save the settings.json file and close it. Your new theme will be saved and automatically applied the next time you open VSCode.