Would it make sense to scope bibtex formatting settings by resource?

[bersbersbers]

Related to #3082, I'd like to convert BibTeX formattings settings scopes to resource. This would involve (I guess) generating BibtexFormatConfigs on the fly, here:

LaTeX-Workshop/src/providers/bibtexcompletion.ts

Line 58 in 49f0491

this.entryItems.push(this.entryToCompletion(entry, entriesReplacements[entry], this.bibtexUtils.bibtexFormatConfig, maxLengths))

LaTeX-Workshop/src/providers/bibtexcompletion.ts

Line 60 in 49f0491

this.entryItems.push(this.entryToCompletion(entry, entries[entry], this.bibtexUtils.bibtexFormatConfig, maxLengths))

as well as in several places in
https://github.com/James-Yu/LaTeX-Workshop/blob/d608023b862e0bc1d39735cc753061a7ffd25036/src/providers/bibtexformatterlib/bibtexutils.ts

The only downside I can think of is performance which (if relevant) might be remedied with caching.

I wonder if the maintainers would be open to a PR.

[jlelong]

The difficulty is not so much to generate BibtexFormatConfig on the fly but rather to take appropriate actions when the current workspace (ie. the workspace of the active text editor) changes.

You point out the lines

LaTeX-Workshop/src/providers/bibtexcompletion.ts

Lines 57 to 61 in fa516ba

	if (entry in entriesReplacements) {
	this.entryItems.push(this.entryToCompletion(entry, entriesReplacements[entry], this.bibtexUtils.bibtexFormatConfig, maxLengths))
	} else {
	this.entryItems.push(this.entryToCompletion(entry, entries[entry], this.bibtexUtils.bibtexFormatConfig, maxLengths))
	}

Note they are called through

LaTeX-Workshop/src/providers/bibtexcompletion.ts

Line 47 in fa516ba

private loadDefaultItems(entriesFile: string, optEntriesFile: string, entriesReplacements: {[key: string]: string[]}) {

in the constructor of BibtexCompleter to build the default suggestion lists once and for all. We would need a way to rebuild these lists whenever the current workspace changes. As there is no notion of active workspace in VS Code (see https://code.visualstudio.com/api/references/vscode-api#WorkspaceFolder), we would need to monitor it inside the extension along with the root file. It may be possible but this is a huge effort and I am not sure yet about the extra maintenance cost.

[bersbersbers]

Thanks for the explanation - a couple of additional thoughts.

So your explanation implies one would need not only generate the BibtexFormatConfig on the fly (e.g., based on the document argument of provideCompletionItems), but also need to move the config-dependent formatting in entryToCompletion to provideCompletionItems - in particular, these lines:

LaTeX-Workshop/src/providers/bibtexcompletion.ts

Lines 94 to 102 in fa516ba

	let s: string = itemName + '{${0:key}'
	itemFields.forEach(field => {
	s += ',\n' + config.tab + (config.case === 'lowercase' ? field : field.toUpperCase())
	s += ' '.repeat(maxLengths[itemName] - field.length) + ' = '
	s += config.left + `$${count}` + config.right
	count++
	})
	s += '\n}'
	suggestion.insertText = new vscode.SnippetString(s)

and thus format completion items on the fly based on a config for the current resource (which is document). Still sounds doable, but I see how this has the potential of generating a less smooth experience compared to preformatting completion items "once and for all".

I am not sure the notion of "monitoring an active workspace" is required if the scope of is resource. What one might use, by contrast, is onDidChangeActiveTextEditor (https://code.visualstudio.com/api/references/vscode-api#window) which could be used to pre-format the completion items (as it is now, but then using the formatting for this document's BibTeX formatting config) so that the actual completion remains as instantaneous as it is.

By the way, my current understanding is that changes to the BibTeX formatting config settings are not picked up by the BibtexCompleter until the extension is reloaded, which may be considered an issue that could be solved along the lines I pointed out (but I may be missing something).

[jlelong]

Still sounds doable, but I see how this has the potential of generating a less smooth experience compared to preformatting completion items "once and for all".

I am against recomputing the complete suggestion list every time completion is triggered because of the computational overhead. A "greener" approach is needed.

By the way, my current understanding is that changes to the BibTeX formatting config settings are not picked up by the BibtexCompleter until the extension is reloaded, which may be considered an issue that could be solved along the lines I pointed out (but I may be missing something).

I added to the description of these settings that any change requires to reload VS Code, see 1ebddde. I agree that it would be a great improvement but it would require a huge implementation effort. I have to think deeper about it.

I am not sure the notion of "monitoring an active workspace" is required if the scope of is resource. What one might use, by contrast, is onDidChangeActiveTextEditor (https://code.visualstudio.com/api/references/vscode-api#window) which could be used to pre-format the completion items (as it is now, but then using the formatting for this document's BibTeX formatting config) so that the actual completion remains as instantaneous as it is.

Of course, we could only monitor the change of active text editor but it would induce a lot of unnecessary computations of the default completion items. The idea behind "monitoring an active workspace" is to avoid these unused computations.

[bersbersbers]

The idea behind "monitoring an active workspace" is to avoid these unused computations.

Understood. The question is if monitoring the active workspace is sufficient if the the settings did in fact become resource-scoped, in which case they might be expected to differ from file to file (note that this is not the use case I had in mind with #3082, but other people might).

Anyway, I see the difficulties now, and I'll continue to think about this as well - thanks a lot for the discussion so far!

[jlelong]

The question is if monitoring the active workspace is sufficient if the the settings did in fact become resource-scoped, in which case they might be expected to differ from file to file

When using a resource scope, the settings associated to a file are actually those tight to the workspace containing the file. So yes, it is sufficient to monitor an active workspace change. This is indeed quite complicated to implement and it is orthogonal to the logic currently used by VS Code for multi-root workspace, see yzhang-gh/vscode-markdown#1092 (comment).

Note that this would still not enable us to make any bibtex settings change effective without reloading the window.

[jlelong]

PR #3219 closes this discussion. Now, all bibtex related settings have the resource scope and any configuration change is immediately effective without reloading.

[bersbersbers]

Excellent, this solves several issues at once. Thanks a lot!

[jlelong]

This is shipped with version 8.24.1, which has just been released.