Introduction

Dart Code extends VS Code with support for the Dart programming language, and provides tools for effectively editing, refactoring, running, and reloading Flutter mobile apps, and AngularDart web apps.

Installation

Dart Code can be installed from the Visual Studio Code Marketplace. Open VS Code Quick Open (Ctrl+P) and paste the following and press enter:

ext install dart-code

Features

• Debug Dart command line apps
• Debug Flutter mobile apps
• Support for flutter hot reload (use the debugger Restart button)
• Select from multiple devices for Flutter debugging (select from the status bar)
• Support for debugging "just my code" or SDK/libraries too (dart.debugSdkLibraries and dart.debugExternalLibraries)
• Automatically finds Dart and Flutter SDKs from PATH or workspace folders
• Notification of new stable Dart SDK releases
• Syntax highlighting
• Code completion
• Snippets
• Realtime errors/warnings/TODOs reported in problems window and with squiggles
• Hovers/tooltip information
• Go to Definition
• Find References
• Code fixes/lightbulb
• Type hierarchy
• Rename refactoring
• Organize directives
• Sort members
• Flutter Doctor command
• Format document
• Support for format-on-save (editor.formatOnSave)
• Support for format-on-type (editor.formatOnType)
• Workspace-wide symbol search
• Automatic closing braces/quotes
• Document symbol list/search with highlighting
• Generation of analysis error reports for easy reporting to the Dart team
• pub get and pub upgrade commands (and flutter equivilents)
• Automatically run pub get when pubspec.yaml is saved
• Supports strong mode and linting (configured in analysis_options.yaml or .analysis_options)
• Other references to symbol under cursor are highlighted

Extension Settings

• dart.allowAnalytics: Whether to send analytics such as startup timings, frequency of use of features and analysis server crashes. Defaults to true.
• dart.closingLabels: Whether to show annotations against constructor, method invocations and lists that span multiple lines. Defaults to true.
• dart.checkForSdkUpdates: Whether to check you are using the latest version of the Dart SDK at startup. Defaults to true.
• dart.debugSdkLibraries: Whether SDK libraries should be marked as debuggable. Defaults to false.
• dart.debugExternalLibraries: Whether libraries should be marked as debuggable. Defaults to false.
• dart.flutterHotReloadOnSave: Whether to automatically send a 'hot reload' request during a Flutter debug session when saving files. Defaults to true.
• dart.flutterSdkPath: Override the detected Flutter SDK to allow you to run from another location.
• dart.insertArgumentPlaceholders: Whether to insert argument placeholders during code completions. Defaults to true.
• dart.lineLength: The maximum length of a line of code. This is used by the document formatter. Defaults to 80.
• dart.pubAdditionalArgs: Additional args to pass to pub get and pub upgrade commands (eg. --packages-dir).
• dart.runPubGetOnPubspecChanges: Whether to automatically run pub get whenever pubspec.yaml is saved. Defaults to true.
• dart.promptToFetchPackages: Whether to prompt to fetch packages when opening a project with out of date packages. Defaults to true.
• dart.sdkPath: If the Dart SDK is not automatically found on your machine from your PATH you can enter the path to it here.
• dart.sdkPaths: If you often switch between multiple Dart SDKs, setting this option to an array of Dart SDK folders or folders that contain multiple Dart SDKs in sub-folders will allow fast switching by clicking the Dart SDK version in the status bar.
• dart.showLintNames: Whether to show the names of linter rules in the problems panel to make it easier to // ignore:.
• dart.showTodos: Whether to show TODOs in the Problems list. Defaults to true.

Analytics

This extension reports some basic events and timings to help inform development decisions, such as:

• Extension load and analysis times
• Whether you have disabled some settings (such as showing TODOs in Problems Window or Closing Labels)
• Frequency of use of features like Hot Reload, Full Restart and Open Observatory
• Crashes in the Dart analysis server

These events will include your platform (Win/Linux/Mac) and also extension/SDK version numbers.

This can be disabled via the dart.allowAnalytics setting.

Custom Colors

Some colors in Dart Code can be customised using the workbench.colourCustomizations section in settings. Supported colors are:

• dart.closingLabels - The color of the "closing label" annotations against constructor, method invocations and lists that span multiple lines

Refactoring Kinds

Code v1.20 gained the ability to keybind quickfixes. To do this you should edit your keybindings.json file and include the ID of the refactor as found below. If the kind for the keybind is set to just a segment of the ID (for example 'refactor.surround') then all actions sharing that prefix will appear in a filtered menu (or if only one, the action invoked immediately). You can control this behaviour with the apply argument see docs.

The list of refactors comes from the Dart analysis server and therefore may change over time. Once this list is available somewhere centrally the readme will be updated to link there.

Note: These IDs are only provided by recent versions of the Dart analysis server and will not work with older v1 builds.

• refactor.addPartDirective - Add 'part' directive
• refactor.addTypeAnnotation - Add type annotation
• refactor.assignToVariable - Assign value to new local variable
• refactor.convert.blockComment - Convert to block documentation comment
• refactor.convert.lineComment - Convert to line documentation comment
• refactor.convert.bodyToAsync - Convert to async function body
• refactor.convert.bodyToBlock - Convert to block body
• refactor.convert.bodyToExpression - Convert to expression body
• refactor.convert.forEachToForIndex - Convert to for-index loop
• refactor.convert.getterToFinalField - Convert to final field
• refactor.convert.toGenericFunctionSyntax - Convert into 'Function' syntax
• refactor.convert.finalFieldToGetter - Convert to getter
• refactor.convert.isNot - Convert to is!
• refactor.convert.isNotEmpty - Convert to 'isNotEmpty'
• refactor.convert.partOfToPartUri - Convert to use a URI
• refactor.convert.toDoubleQuotedString - Convert to double quoted string
• refactor.convert.toConstructorFieldParameter - Convert to field formal parameter
• refactor.convert.toConstructorNormalParameter - Convert to normal parameter
• refactor.convert.toSingleQuotedString - Convert to single quoted string
• refactor.encapsulateField - Encapsulate field
• refactor.exchangeOperands - Exchange operands
• refactor.extractClass - Extract class into file
• refactor.flutter.convert.childToChildren - Convert to children:
• refactor.flutter.convert.toStatefulWidget - Convert to StatefulWidget
• refactor.flutter.move.down - Move widget down
• refactor.flutter.move.up - Move widget up
• refactor.flutter.removeWidget - Remove widget
• refactor.flutter.swap.withChild - Swap with child
• refactor.flutter.swap.withParent - Swap with parent
• refactor.flutter.wrap.center - Center widget
• refactor.flutter.wrap.column - Wrap with Column
• refactor.flutter.wrap.generic - Wrap with new widget
• refactor.flutter.wrap.padding - Add padding
• refactor.flutter.wrap.row - Wrap with Row
• refactor.addShowCombinator - Add explicit 'show' combinator
• refactor.introduceLocalCast - Introduce new local with tested type
• refactor.invertIf - Invert 'if' statement
• refactor.joinWithInnerIf - Join 'if' statement with inner 'if' statement
• refactor.joinWithOuterIf - Join 'if' statement with outer 'if' statement
• refactor.joinVariableDeclaration - Join variable declaration
• refactor.removeTypeAnnotation - Remove type annotation
• refactor.convert.conditionalToIfElse - Replace conditional with 'if-else'
• refactor.convert.ifElseToConditional - Replace 'if-else' with conditional ('c ? x : y')
• refactor.splitIfConjunction - Split && condition
• refactor.splitVariableDeclaration - Split variable declaration
• refactor.surround.block - Surround with block
• refactor.surround.doWhile - Surround with 'do-while'
• refactor.surround.forEach - Surround with 'for'
• refactor.surround.forIn - Surround with 'for-in'
• refactor.surround.if - Surround with 'if'
• refactor.surround.tryCatch - Surround with 'try-catch'
• refactor.surround.tryFinally - Surround with 'try-finally'
• refactor.surround.while - Surround with 'while'

Release Notes

For full release notes, see the changelog.