vscode: Keyboard actions in file explorer not working and is stuck in fancy tree filter mode

Will introduce exactly that: a keybinding/command which enables that mode, cancellable by <kbd>Escape</kbd>, in which users can use the filter. This behaviour would be regulated by a setting like workbench.list.manualKeyboardNavigation, defaulting to false. VIM users would have to switch it to true. Any user could switch it to true.

The golden hammer would be to have this working automatically if VIM is enabled… thinking more about it… 🤔

Created Vim PR: https://github.com/VSCodeVim/Vim/pull/3432

https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode/issues/68233 Introduced a workbench.list.automaticKeyboardNavigation setting for people who have single letter keybindings for lists/trees. When false, you must run the list.toggleKeyboardNavigation command to enter filter mode, for which you can configure a keybinding.

This is already out in Insiders. It will come out next stable and I’ll document it in the release notes.

I verified that setting the listAutomaticKeyboardNavigation context key disables the keyboard navigation and that it can be re-enabled with the keyboard shortcut

@mjbvz would you please tell me where should i write this setting in vscode settings? Can’t find out. Tried settings.json, didn’t worked for me.

Fixed by introducing a new command list.toggleKeyboardNavigation and a new context key listAutomaticKeyboardNavigation which, when set to false`, requires the aforementioned command to be run in order to go into filter mode.

I would prefer a solution that does not change settings simply because a user is stuck with this setting once VIM is uninstalled again.

my 2 cents: filtering should only kick in if a key is pressed that is not associated with a command. this behaviour is now broken not only for users of the VIM extension but anyone that changed keybindings to “printable” characters, if I am not mistaken?

@jpoon https://twitter.com/joaomoreno/status/1087365659049295873

Sorry, what is this? Don’t have context.

So we just need to find a way to either automate this for VIM users, or communicate to the VIM extension that it should set keyboard navigation to simple and/or announce it in the release notes.

At the minimum, we can add it to the VIM readme. Maybe I’m a purist, but I’m not a fan of extensions auto-setting workspace/workbench-scoped configurations (ie. I don’t want extensions mucking with my settings).