Visual Studio Code

Visual Studio Code (VSC) is a free code editor from Microsoft that runs on Windows and Mac and has similar features to Sublime Text.

There is a dispute among programmers about which one is better.

Visual Studio Code supports, among other things, the use of the HSF format, which the LP_XMLConverter outputs in the form of individual script files that can be optimally edited in the editor.
There is also code folding and other cool features similar to Sublime Text.

GDL extension for Visual Studio Code

Graphisoft released its "GDL extension for Visual Studio Code" on 30.09.2020.

You can download it from the VSCode Marketplace or install it directly via VSCode->Extensions (search for GDL).

  • The GDL extension supports syntax highlighting and code completion. In this example, you type "poly2" and you are then offered all commands with poly2 to choose from.
  • Code completion provides the command with syntax variables, which you can navigate through one after another with tab jumps.
  • And there are snippets for every GDL command, every global variable or request (with the code completion described above), as well as subroutines, hotspot or hotspot2 (length editing triplet).
  • Also nice is the display of subroutines in the side panel of VSC (right). Here you can directly jump to any subroutine in the main window. The subroutines are also displayed in the right sidebar (the mini preview) as red dots. In addition, macro calls are displayed in the same window (bottom) and appear in the list above the subroutines.
  • Illegal variable names are marked, e.g. 6var = 1.2

Unfortunately, the GDL extension is somewhat behind the other Sublime extensions in terms of functionality, as some important features are missing or incomplete:

  • If you want to use the GDL extension for Visual Studio Code together with Visual Studio Code as an editor really efficiently, an automated routine for converting GSM to HSF and vice versa is essential. It is an absolute must-have that Graphisoft must definitely add. This is something that is not easy to achieve even with the "Tasks" feature of VSC, so it should be an integral part of the plugin.
  • All possible editor functions should be used to optimize the extension: For example, automatic indentation is currently missing, which makes GDL coding just as cumbersome as in the native GDL editor. Other key features: bracket matching and bracket automation, bracket auto-surrounding, folding by markers, and others.