The most important tool for any programmer is a good code editor. While you could write code in any text-based editor (TextEdit, Notepad, etc.), you’ll be lacking some key features that code editors provide including:
In this course, we’ll start with the general purpose code editor VSCode (Visual Studio Code). This editor is popular, free, cross-platform and highly customizable via extensions. Later in the semester, we’ll also work with R Studio - a code editor customized for working with R.
@download To get started, download VSCode from https://code.visualstudio.com.
Once downloaded, run the installer and follow the instructions provided.
Color themes can be installed via Extensions, accessible from the activity bar on the left.
If you want your interface to look like what is shown in the videos, the theme I use is luxcium.pop-n-lock-theme-vscode. Feel free to use whatever theme you like.
The file explorer (accessible from the activity bar on the left) is used to open project directories where you can navigate and work with your project files.
To access Settings in VSCode, click the cog icon on the bottom left then choose Settings.
VSCode has a lot of settings available, so take advantage of the search bar up top when looking for something.
For this course, you should adjust the following settings:
Set Auto Save to onFocusChange. This will make it so your files are automatically saved whenever you switch contexts (e.g. file tabs, or out of VSCode into another window).
Enable Format on Save, so that VSCode’s auto-formatter is regularly run on your code files keeping them tidy.
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