Shortly after switching from vim and tmux to VS Code, I realized that I
needed something similar to tmuxinator for easily booting up all of an application's processes.
For example, in a Rails app I might need to run the following:
- Rails server
- webpack-dev-server
- sidekiq
- guard
- mailcatcher
I used to use foreman for this, but after a while I really wanted each process in its own space to make them easier to parse.
Recently I discovered the power and flexibility of VS Code custom tasks.
VS Code custom tasks
VS Code allows setting up custom tasks within .vscode/tasks.json at project's root, and these tasks can be triggered from the command palette (⌘⇧P → Tasks: Run Task).
Here's an example task file on a project for a current client:
{
"version": "2.0.0",
"tasks": [
{
"label": "Boot",
"dependsOn": ["Server", "Sidekiq", "Guard", "Webpack", "Mailcatcher"],
"problemMatcher": [],
"runOptions": {
"runOn": "folderOpen"
}
},
{
"label": "Server",
"type": "shell",
"command": "pkill -f puma || bundle && yarn install && bin/rails server -p 3001",
"group": "build",
"presentation": {
"clear": true,
"echo": true,
"focus": false,
"reveal": "always"
},
"problemMatcher": []
},
{
"label": "Sidekiq",
"type": "shell",
"command": "bundle exec sidekiq -t 25",
"group": "build",
"presentation": {
"clear": true,
"echo": true,
"focus": false,
"reveal": "always"
},
"problemMatcher": []
},
{
"label": "Guard",
"type": "shell",
"command": "bundle exec guard",
"group": "build",
"presentation": {
"clear": true,
"echo": true,
"focus": false,
"reveal": "always"
}
},
{
"label": "Webpack",
"type": "shell",
"command": "./bin/webpack-dev-server",
"group": "build",
"presentation": {
"clear": true,
"echo": true,
"focus": false,
"reveal": "always"
}
},
{
"label": "Mailcatcher",
"type": "shell",
"command": "mailcatcher",
"presentation": {
"reveal": "always",
"focus": true
},
"problemMatcher": []
},
{
"label": "Open Rails console",
"type": "shell",
"command": "bin/rails console",
"presentation": {
"reveal": "always",
"focus": true
},
"problemMatcher": []
}
]
}
The Boot task automatically kicks off each of the tasks in the dependsOn key in a separate terminal process when opening the project in VS Code (see the runOptions setting).
And voila! To start hacking on a project, all you have to do is open it in VS Code. You can also use ⌘R to reboot your application.
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