Suggestion: Command Search-As-You-Type

[aravindet]

Ctrl+E commands are not very discoverable for new users.

Sublime/Atom Cmd[+Shift]+P commands have a dropdown of available commands that is filtered as you type, which improves discoverability of commands and also saves on typing (you can type a few letters of the command and hit enter). Something like this would be a great addition to micro.

When the first word is completed, this dropdown could switch to displaying documentation about the selected command's arguments to help the user further.

Also, the dropdown could also be used for directory browsing or file search when the user wishes to open, save or search for a file.

[samdmarshall]

This functionality (if implemented as described) could be useful for autocomplete as well.

[GeigerCounter]

@aravindet @samdmarshall - This is probably a silly question, but are we talking fish-style search-as-you-type? ( i.e. as you type a command, the most "likely" probability shows up in another colour and you press tab to fill in the command? ) Cos I'm a bit confused as to the nature of this request. Also, did you try "> help commands" ?

[aravindet]

Not exactly. The suggestion is for a temporary menu that appears above the command input line while the command input has focus. Similar to the command line and menu that appear when you press Cmd+P / Cmd+Shift+P in sublime, atom, VS Code etc. Up/Down arrow keys can be used to select an item from this menu and pressing Enter would execute it or complete the word in the command line.

…

On Tue 28 Mar, 2017, 4:36 PM Collin Warren, ***@***.***> wrote: @aravindet <https://github.com/aravindet> @samdmarshall <https://github.com/samdmarshall> - This is probably a silly question, but are we talking fish-style search-as-you-type? ( i.e. as you type a command, the most "likely" probability shows up in another colour and you press tab to fill in the command? ) Cos I'm a bit confused as to the nature of this request. Also, did you try "> help commands" ? — You are receiving this because you were mentioned. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#523 (comment)>, or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AAM2F3bVVZaygQg8TJ2cNca7-cixn2-Gks5rqMaMgaJpZM4LigMo> .

[GeigerCounter]

@aravindet I'm afraid that can't be done currently. It'd require an extension of the draw system. There are no plans to do that any time soon as if we're going to be making any changes to the draw system, it'd be to improve performance and debug first. Perhaps at some point in the distant future - like August maybe - we could implement a dialog system that could be used for this and plugins. Or maybe it could be done with a plugin and a specialized buffer... I'll look into this, but for now the recommended way to learn about commands is use > help commands

@samdmarshall You have any desire to implement this as a plugin?

[samdmarshall]

nope

[MarcusE1W]

It beeing August I hope it might be ok to bring this up again. I think to have a search as you type command palette menu is very useful to raise beginner friendliness.

• In addition to show a command palette i would suggest to show all available actions (as described in the help keybindings text) with it's key-bindings and maybe a short description.
• That way it would be very easy to find every command/action and also help to memorize the key-bindings.
• Lesser used actions would not need a key-binding at all.
• You don't need to remember key-bindings but just describe what you want to do and the search finds the right command/actions for you

I appreciate it might not be your highest agenda item and things are easier written than done but maybe when you make future design decisions you could keep this option in mind ?

• I think it would really hugely improve (the already good) beginner friendliness and be a great feature next to the good help tool

[terokarvinen]

I wrote Palettero, a command palette plugin.

Palettero has find-as-you type, searches both commands and their descriptions.

It supports all micro built in commands. It autodetects all help files and colorschemes. You can define your own preset textfilters and commands with "editmenu". And it comes with some 20 pre-made textfilters.

Palettero screenshots, installation, tutorial

Palettero source code on GitHub

It's beta, and only tested on Linux.