Visual Studio Code 1.51 brings workbench improvements

Visual Studio Code 1.51, an upgrade to Microsoft’s popular open source code editor published this week, is being described by the project as a housekeeping release but with workbench and terminal capabilities added.

The workbench now features more prominent pinned tabs, which show their pin icon even while inactive, making them easier to identify. Should an editor be pinned and contain unsaved changes, the icon reflects both states. The workbench also now uses a custom hover instead of a native tooltip in extension tree views. The hover is consistent across host platforms and fits better with the UX.

Other additions and improvements in Visual Studio Code 1.51:

• Developers using the workbench now can install an extension without synchronizing it while settings sync is enabled.
• The editor now supports installing an extension VSIX file from Windows Explorer by right-clicking on a VSIX file and choosing the “Install Extension VSIX” context menu item.
• A “local echo” mode in the terminal attempts to predict modifications and cursor movements made locally and show them in the UI without requiring a round trip to the server.
• IntelliSense improvements have been made to the suggestions UI, including that it now can be resized. Also, the cursor can be moved while suggestions are showing. A new editor.suggest.insertMode setting allows developers to configure whether they prefer insert or replace.
• Custom snippets in the Emmet web toolkit have returned. Snippets automatically refresh upon saving the snippets file or updating the emmet.extensionsPath setting.
• The source control input box saves commit message history. Also for source control, a “Git: Rebase branch…” command has been added, for rebasing a branch using the UI. A “GitClone (Recursive)” command allows recursive cloning of Git repos, including nested Git submodules.