Development.md

Development

Running the extension with local Motoko compiler changes

Assumption: motoko, node-motoko and this repository are in the same directory, e.g.

~/node-motoko
~/motoko
~/vscode-motoko

Quick start

Start debugging the extension using the Run Extension with Local Motoko configuration. Choose this configuration and hit F5.

It should apply all the steps below automatically. Here is an overview of the steps:

1. Building the motoko repo with the needed executables
2. Updating the executables in node-motoko repo
3. Using the changed node-motoko as a dependency in vscode-motoko
4. Running the extension with the local Motoko compiler

Manual steps

1. Inside the motoko directory

Prepare your local changes, make sure they compile.

2. Inside the node-motoko directory

Build the project and execute the generate script to copy the compiled moc.js and moc_interpreter.js:

npm install
npm run build
npm run generate local

3. Inside the vscode-motoko directory

1. Change the motoko dependency in package.json to point to the local repo:

npm install ../node-motoko 

It should look like this:

"motoko": "file:../node-motoko",

2. Make sure the .vscodeignore file is present and contains ../**/* to ignore bundling node_modules from the node-motoko directory.

4. Package the extension and install it

Run npm run package to package the extension and install it:

code --install-extension vscode-motoko-*.*.*.vsix