Support more options for formatting text and inserting links to commands in Output Channel

[seanmcbreen]

From @ArtemGovorov on November 18, 2015 5:37

More specifically:

• colors and other text formatting options.
• inserting links that can execute commands with parameters. I only need to open files, but the existing pattern matching doesn't work for me for 2 reasons:
  • no relative paths support and long paths don't look good and waste space.
  • file links open files in the same pane where I had the Output pane opened. What I'd like to do is to open files in a text editor (if it's currently opened as well), so that the text editor and the Output pane could be used side by side.

So here is what I have in VS Code currently:

Here is what I'd like to have:

Copied from original issue: Microsoft/vscode-extensionbuilders#124

[seanmcbreen]

Very fair request - we have been adding more to the debug console so this also makes sense @bpasero are you the right guy to think about this.

[seanmcbreen]

@ArtemGovorov how is Wallaby going I've not yet seen a publish Zurich will be online soon let us know if you need help. For publishing @joaomoreno is your guy.

[seanmcbreen]

From @ArtemGovorov on November 18, 2015 5:45

@seanmcbreen Thanks, it's getting there, most of the functionality is working. I do need to do a few more things before publishing it though.

[seanmcbreen]

From @SamVerschueren on November 18, 2015 7:54

ANSI color codes (chalk) will be supported in the future. See https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode-extensionbuilders/issues/69.

[seanmcbreen]

From @ArtemGovorov on November 18, 2015 8:12

I'd rather use some higher level abstractions than using any specific colors. For example, it may be better to specify CSS classes (like error or info), that VS Code is using everywhere else, and to avoid specifying a fixed color that may not look good in a user theme.

I like how it's done in Atom: you may use LESS variables (that may be changed by a theme) to define classes in your extension LESS file and you can later apply these classes in your HTML. But Atom allows to work with HTML/DOM while VS Code doesn't.

[seanmcbreen]

From @SamVerschueren on November 18, 2015 8:16

I would rather see that as a separate component then and keep the OutputChannel as is. I see the OutputChannel more like a cli that prints information to the screen.

[seanmcbreen]

From @ArtemGovorov on November 18, 2015 8:38

A separate component with full HTML/JavaScript support would be nice to have as well, but for now all I need is theme friendly colours and enhanced links in the OutputChannel, I don't think it will make it less cli-ish.

[Tyriar]

Related: #571

[mattflix]

Chrome and Firefox already handle this nicely with CSS styles (pass style objects to %c specifiers in the format string):

https://developer.chrome.com/devtools/docs/console#styling-console-output-with-css

It would great if the VS Code console could just support the same interface. It's simple and easy to use. Please don't reinvent the world.

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That said, ANSI escape sequences sent to the console (which under the covers might be able to use the same style mechanism) should also "just work".