Suggestions box's first choice is sometimes selected, sometimes NOT

[iuliust]

Type: Bug

Since last update, auto-completion is completely broken.

As I type a few characters, the suggestions box appears, but more ofter than not (and contrary to expectation), none of the box's proposals is selected : I have to press the down arrow to select the 1st line!

Consequence:
if I don't pay attention to whether the first choice is pre-selected, I hit ENTER if the first result looks like it's what I want to insert, but since nothing was actually selected, this creates a new line instead... This is probably a bug because this is a terrible UX.

Aside from that, thank you so much for your hard work, VS Code is such a outstanding product!

VS Code version: Code 1.75.0 (e2816fe, 2023-02-01T15:23:45.584Z)
OS version: Windows_NT x64 10.0.22000
Modes:
Sandboxed: Yes

System Info

Item	Value
CPUs	Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-10750H CPU @ 2.60GHz (12 x 2592)
GPU Status	2d_canvas: enabled canvas_oop_rasterization: disabled_off direct_rendering_display_compositor: disabled_off_ok gpu_compositing: enabled multiple_raster_threads: enabled_on opengl: enabled_on rasterization: enabled raw_draw: disabled_off_ok skia_renderer: enabled_on video_decode: enabled video_encode: enabled vulkan: disabled_off webgl: enabled webgl2: enabled webgpu: disabled_off
Load (avg)	undefined
Memory (System)	31.64GB (5.05GB free)
Process Argv	--crash-reporter-id 7dc5599a-5121-4310-803e-9045cdb3905e
Screen Reader	no
VM	0%

Extensions (20)

Extension	Author (truncated)	Version
codesnap	adp	1.3.4
ng-template	Ang	15.1.0
markdown-mermaid	bie	1.17.4
npm-intellisense	chr	1.4.4
vscode-markdownlint	Dav	0.49.0
vscode-eslint	dba	2.2.6
gitlens	eam	13.2.0
EditorConfig	Edi	0.16.4
vscode-test-explorer	hbe	2.21.1
angular2-switcher	inf	0.4.0
karma-test-explorer	luc	0.8.1
dotenv	mik	1.0.1
vscode-docker	ms-	1.23.3
vscode-language-pack-fr	MS-	1.75.2023020109
remote-containers	ms-	0.275.0
remote-wsl	ms-	0.75.1
test-adapter-converter	ms-	0.1.6
vsliveshare	ms-	1.0.5828
material-icon-theme	PKi	4.23.1
vscode-npm-scripts	tra	0.2.1

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[KunalTanwar]

Same Issue!!

Before 1.75.0 it autofocuses on the suggestions we just need to use Arrow keys for the desired one but now it is not auto focusing and if we press any Arrow key the cursor just shifts to the above or below line hiding the dropdown suggestions.

[ArturoDent]

Check this new setting:

Editor > Suggest: Selection Mode

Is that set to always?

[KunalTanwar]

Yes it is set to always

[dalbitresb12]

Related #173343.

I've also checked that option and it is also always, but the first choice is still not always selected.

[jrieken]

Does this occur when invoking a completion when just having accepted one, esp. a snippet completion? Do you have the editor.suggest.snippetsPreventQuickSuggestions setting configured?

[KunalTanwar]

Does this occur when invoking a completion when just having accepted one, esp. a snippet completion? Do you have the editor.suggest.snippetsPreventQuickSuggestions setting configured?

Yes it is set to true but still same problem sometimes working sometimes not!

[dalbitresb12]

I think the real problem here is that the suggestion box is showing up when using snippets with editor.suggest.snippetsPreventQuickSuggestions set to true (which is the default). It should only show up when it is set to false.

I've done some testing using Windows Sandbox with versions 1.74.3 and 1.75.0. With "editor.suggest.snippetsPreventQuickSuggestions": false, the first option is selected in both versions. With "editor.suggest.snippetsPreventQuickSuggestions": true (or unset), in 1.74.3 the box doesn't show while in 1.75.0 it shows up with the first option not selected.

You can see both behaviors in the following videos:

1.74.3

Code-1.74.3.mp4

1.75.0

Code-1.75.0.mp4

[jrieken]

in 1.74.3 the box doesn't show while in 1.75.0 it shows up with the first option not selected.

That change was done on purpose but it wasn't clearly communicated. In the past we would truly suppress Intellisense when in snippet mode. Over the last years this has caused much confusion and heated debates because people believe IntelliSense is broken. The underlying conflict is that both (snippets and suggest) use Tab to either advance to next placeholder or accept a completion. They are mutually exclusive and one is given precedence making folks believe things are broken.

Since IntelliSense has the new "no select" mode I figured it is a good compromise to use that instead of suppressing suggest. Wrt muscle memory nothing should have changed, pressing Tab still goes to the next snippet placeholder but wrt the UI are now seeing the suggest widget (as ambient offering)

[jrieken]

/cc @waynebloss

[ghost]

I am not sure what the correct workaround should be, but I think that things started working again when I set snippetsPreventQuickSuggestions to false.

I searched around for a "no select" Intellisense setting but I couldn't find one. (Is this a reference to editor.suggest.selectionMode and setting it to never?)

Basically, I guess I just want it to work the way that it always had worked: Whether I'm using a snippet or not, when I see the autocomplete/intellisense popup list the first item should always be highlighted and when I press Tab, it completes the selected item and moves to the next snippet placeholder if in snippet mode...

Thanks!

[fabioz]

Is there any way to revert to the previous mode since it was done "on purpose"?

Personally, I find the new way extremely annoying (and given that it always was this way, I think it should default to the way it always was and an option could turn on the new option which doesn't select completions even though they're being shown when on snippet mode).

[fabioz]

As a note, it seems that setting "editor.suggest.snippetsPreventQuickSuggestions": false does improve it for me (at least when a completion is shown it can be applied).

But now I'm confused... when "editor.suggest.snippetsPreventQuickSuggestions": true, the completions are actually being shown but without marking a completion item as the selected item (so, it doesn't prevent quick suggestions, it makes it so that it shows it but requires the user to use Ctrl+Space again to focus it, which is not good IMHO -- definitely not good as a default, and that seems to be the bug here... in 1.74.3 the completions wouldn't be shown in that case, so, there was no confusion, the new way of handling "editor.suggest.snippetsPreventQuickSuggestions": true to show completions but not select it is very confusing).

Maybe it'd be better if it'd be controlled by something as:

"editor.suggest.onSnippetMode": "showCompletionsButDontSelect" (current behavior -- seems strange to me... maybe it could be there but not default)
"editor.suggest.onSnippetMode": "dontShowCompletions" (old behavior -- maybe not ideal, as users think completions don't work but is reasonable for those preferring placeholders over completions?)
"editor.suggest.onSnippetMode": "showCompletionsAndApplyOnTabAndEnter" (old behavior when "editor.suggest.snippetsPreventQuickSuggestions": false was active -- it can backfire because pressing tab wouldn't go to the next snippet and would apply the completion, but maybe that'd be a better default as there wouldn't be a confusion that code-completion isn't working).
"editor.suggest.onSnippetMode": "showCompletionsAndApplyOnEnter" (I guess that'd be the ideal setting for me -- as I use enter to apply completions and not tab, but for users using tab to apply completions I don't really see a way out anyways as the conflict is there by design).

I understand there's a conflict that needs to be solved where tab can be used both to apply a completion and go to the next placeholder and that maybe a setting can help there, but showing a completion and not letting it be applied makes it confusing IMHO and shouldn't be the default.

[jrieken]

@fabioz spot on. The setting should be extended to support the new mode. I missed that because my reasoning was the default didn't change wrt the keypress sequences. When in snippet mode, pressing Tab wouldn't insert a suggestion (because suppressed/invisible 🤓) and it still doesn't. However, the confusing part that has changed is that the widget shows but isn't active. The default will likely be what it is today. The snippet suppressing has confused v e r y many folks over the years and we have received countless of issues and questions why IntelliSense is "broken" when editing snippets. This change is meant to bring clarity for that but needs more tweaking

[fabioz]

@jrieken note that there is no conflict when a user uses tab to go to the next placeholder and enter to apply a completion (so, if the completions are there I'd definitely expect enter to apply it and tab to go to the next placeholder...).

[daguitosama]

editor.suggest.snippetsPreventQuickSuggestions : false

This setting fixed the issue for me, big thanks.
At this point I think is pretty hard to not press Enter when the suggestion widget shows up. That Enter almost press itself.

[jrieken]

When you make stable release?

This will ship early June

[michaeldaw]

This is what is happening for me in 1.79-insiders:

clip01.mp4

[michaeldaw]

I just read this comment in #183411

Frankly, I find that remark inflammatory.

I've been using various IDE's for nearly 20 years. You can always use TAB to confirm a completion suggestion. Always. Whatever the original intent of this change was, it is an unmitigated failure. Restore the original functionality.

[rami3l]

As someone from the "Team Tab" I second @michaeldaw's comment.

As a matter of fact, editor.suggest.snippetsPreventQuickSuggestions being true by default has already caused confusion for people like me and I have been using VSCode with this value set to false since I'm aware of this option.

Removing this option might be good, but I'm aware of it exactly because I want to use Tab completions in snippets.

Personally I don't mind jumping to another completion point "manually".
Better yet, maybe the hot key for jumping to the next completion point should be changed in the case of hot key conflicts, as suggested in https://stackoverflow.com/a/76335930.

[jrieken]

We will revisit this

[jrieken]

#183954 is up for more refinements/changes:

1. reverts the TAB changes (undoes what was said here)
2. revert the focus behaviours (the cause of this issue)
3. flips the default for the snippetsPreventQuickSuggestions setting

The latter isn't guaranteed to happen and we might revisit this. It's not that we are making changes in thin air, usually things start with users reporting an issue and it's sometimes hard to judge how many folks share the pain or are happy. So, please bear with us

[jrieken]

To verify

• ensure the snippetsPreventQuickSuggestions setting is back and its default is false
• ensure typing inside a placeholder of a snippet shows suggestions, ensure TAB accepts it
• ensure ESC dismisses suggestion and that snippet mode stays on (until hitting ESC again)
• turn snippetsPreventQuickSuggestions to true and ensure typing in a snippet placeholder doesn't trigger quick suggestions

[hediet]

turn snippetsPreventQuickSuggestions to true and ensure typing in a snippet placeholder doesn't trigger quick suggestions

Does not work for me: