Search seeding is inconsistent

[akbyrd]

Issue Type: Bug

Invoking workbench.action.findInFiles when you have no text selected will seed the search text with the word closest to your cursor. Sometimes.

If the search box is empty it will be seeded with the word under your cursor. If the search box is not empty it is not seeded.

This makes it impossible to know what invoking workbench.action.findInFiles will actually do unless you remember what text is present in the search panel, which probably isn't even open.

Expected result is that the behavior is consistent. Probably that the search box is always seeded when editor.find.seedSearchStringFromSelection is enabled.

VS Code version: Code 1.41.1 (26076a4, 2019-12-18T14:58:56.166Z)
OS version: Windows_NT x64 10.0.17763

[roblourens]

Really the problem is overloading that keyboard shortcut to mean "search with this text" and also just "focus the search view". I didn't want it to be too aggressive when using ctrl+shift+f just to focus the search view, especially now that changing it would trigger a search. I will leave this open for suggestions but I'm nervous about changing this now.

Original discussion was here #17974 (comment)

[eamodio]

Maybe it can be a setting if we don't want the change the current behavior? But at least for me, I always want Ctrl+Shift+F to search seeded with the text

[akbyrd]

@roblourens Since there's a separate option for whether to seed or not the overloading isn't terrible. I could imagine there being separate commands for "focus with seed" and "focus without seed", but it's not something I need personally.

I'm not particularly concerned with whether the focus command seeds when there's no selection or not. I'm only advocating for it being consistently one or the other.

[akbyrd]

Another option is to promote editor.find.seedSearchStringFromSelection to a enum: never, selection, nearestWord.

[roblourens]

Out of curiosity do you two not use that keyboard shortcut to focus/reveal the search view?

[eamodio]

Hrm, I don't think I really ever use it for show/focus. Maybe a compromise, is to show/focus the view if its hidden, and always overwrite if its visible. Then you can at least just hit it twice to overwrite if that is what you want.

[akbyrd]

I use workbench.action.findInFiles to both show the panel/search view and to focus it.

[bronson]

I'm glad this issue is open. I spent quite a while trying to figure out how to use Cmd-F and Cmd-Shift-F: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/59888563/how-to-find-selection-in-files The current behavior is a little confusing.

Personally, as long as they behave consistently, I don't think it matters too much if they both pre-seed or not. That said, I hope you choose to either always pre-seed or never pre-seed. Pre-seeding only when it's blank is difficult to figure out, especially when you're not expecting it.

[roblourens]

I have been thinking about this and related issues again lately #91901

And I am interested in your feedback on this suggestion #91901 (comment)

[roblourens]

Merging into #91901

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