VS code nrf connect create a new application

RE: VS code nrf connect create a new application

sachrmed — Fri, 15 Sep 2023 16:21:34 GMT

Thanks for taking the time to read the feedback and reply!

It's really a minor inconvenience, but it would be great to be able to search/filter the samples and quickly scroll through the associated readme. But I do appreciate that VSCode does impose some limitations on UI.

Thanks again! It's nice to know that you're listening. 🙂

RE: VS code nrf connect create a new application

ovrebekk — Fri, 15 Sep 2023 11:13:25 GMT

This is related to a recent update to the VS Code extension, as indicated by sachrmed.

For more information about this change please refer to the following section of the release notes:
https://nrfconnect.github.io/vscode-nrf-connect/release_notes/connect/2023.9.169.html#create-new-application

Best regards
Torbjørn

RE: VS code nrf connect create a new application

Trond Einar Snekvik — Fri, 15 Sep 2023 10:18:52 GMT

Hey, I lead the VS Code team, vote noted :)

We actually moved away from the old window to get out of technical difficulties that weren't really solvable. The inline documentation view broke a lot, and we had no way to control it to fit the VS Code context. We have some upcoming changes to the documentation that would make this worse, and instead of investing more time in a solution that would keep adding maintenance work and disrupt the user experience, we decided to change the workflow sooner rather than later.

I can definitely appreciate that the current workflow lacks some of the context the old window provided. I would argue that you need to go through the same number of steps as before, but it does feel a bit more tedious when they're presented as linear steps. I'll see what we can do about that.

To be honest, it's unlikely that we'll go back to the old design. Not because we think it's a categorically worse interface, but because it's just not a feasible approach from an engineering point of view. In the end, we'd rather give users a rock solid but conservative interface than an ambitious but broken one when it comes to fundamental functionality such as this, and we there just isn't a way for us to make the ambitious interface rock solid.

We will take the feedback into consideration though, and spend more time to see if we can fit more of the good parts of the old interface into the new one.

RE: VS code nrf connect create a new application

sachrmed — Wed, 13 Sep 2023 18:35:58 GMT

The VS Code extension was updated and this took me by surprise as well.

I believe there's a dialogue that prompts for a path to save the project after you select a sample.

I find this new interface a lot more confusing and difficult to use. The previous interface allowed me to browse through samples and immediately view the readme to see if it's a sample I'm interested it. This new interface requires too many clicks in a smaller interface. Opening the associated documentation in my browser also keeps it disjoint from the sample list and really slows me down. If anyone from Nordic is reading this, here's a vote to go back to the previous interface.