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Set up your environment

Deno comes with many of the tools that are commonly needed for developing applications, including a full language server (LSP) to help power your IDE of choice. This page will help you set up your environment to get the most out of Deno while you are developing.

We'll cover:

  • How to use Deno with your favorite editor/IDE
  • How to generate shell completions

Setting up your editor/IDE Jump to heading

Visual Studio Code Jump to heading

If you haven’t already, download and install Visual Studio Code from the official website.

In the Extensions tab, search for "Deno" and install the extension by Denoland.

Next, open the Command Palette by pressing Ctrl+Shift+P and type Deno: Initialize Workspace Configuration. Select this option to configure Deno for your workspace.

The VSCode command palette with the Deno: Initialize Workspace Configuration option selected.

A file called .vscode/settings.json will be created in your workspace with the following configuration:

{
  "deno.enable": true
}

That’s it! You’ve successfully set up your developer environment for Deno using VSCode. You will now get all the benefits of Deno’s LSP, including IntelliSense, code formatting, linting, and more.

JetBrains IDEs Jump to heading

To install the Deno Plugin, open your IDE and go to File > Settings. Navigate to Plugins and search for Deno. Install the official Deno plugin.

The WebStorm plugins settings

To configure the Plugin, go to File > Settings again. Navigate to Languages & Frameworks > Deno. Check Enable Deno for your project and specify the path to the Deno executable (if it has not been auto-detected).

Check out this blog post to learn more about how to get started with Deno in Jetbrains IDEs.

Vim/Neovim via plugins Jump to heading

Deno is well-supported on both Vim and Neovim via coc.nvim, vim-easycomplete and ALE. coc.nvim offers plugins to integrate to the Deno language server while ALE supports it out of the box.

Neovim 0.6+ using the built-in language server Jump to heading

To use the Deno language server install nvim-lspconfig and follow the instructions to enable the supplied Deno configuration.

Note that if you also have ts_ls as an LSP client, you may run into issues where both ts_ls and denols are attached to your current buffer. To resolve this, make sure to set some unique root_dir for both ts_ls and denols. You may also need to set single_file_support to false for ts_ls to prevent it from running in single file mode. Here is an example of such a configuration:

local nvim_lsp = require('lspconfig')
nvim_lsp.denols.setup {
  on_attach = on_attach,
  root_dir = nvim_lsp.util.root_pattern("deno.json", "deno.jsonc"),
}

nvim_lsp.ts_ls.setup {
  on_attach = on_attach,
  root_dir = nvim_lsp.util.root_pattern("package.json"),
  single_file_support = false
}

For Deno, the example above assumes a deno.json or deno.jsonc file exists at the root of the project.

coc.nvim Jump to heading

Once you have coc.nvim installed, you need to install the required coc-deno via :CocInstall coc-deno.

Once the plugin is installed, and you want to enable Deno for a workspace, run the command :CocCommand deno.initializeWorkspace and you should be able to utilize commands like gd (goto definition) and gr (go/find references).

ALE Jump to heading

ALE supports Deno via the Deno language server out of the box and in many uses cases doesn't require additional configuration. Once you have ALE installed you can perform the command :help ale-typescript-deno to get information on the configuration options available.

For more information on how to setup ALE (like key bindings) refer to the official documentation.

Vim-EasyComplete Jump to heading

Vim-EasyComplete supports Deno without any other configuration. Once you have vim-easycomplete installed, you need install deno via :InstallLspServer deno if you haven't installed deno. You can get more information from official documentation.

Emacs Jump to heading

lsp-mode Jump to heading

Emacs supports Deno via the Deno language server using lsp-mode. Once lsp-mode is installed it should support Deno, which can be configured to support various settings.

eglot Jump to heading

You can also use built-in Deno language server by using eglot.

An example configuration for Deno via eglot:

(add-to-list 'eglot-server-programs '((js-mode typescript-mode) . (eglot-deno "deno" "lsp")))

  (defclass eglot-deno (eglot-lsp-server) ()
    :documentation "A custom class for deno lsp.")

  (cl-defmethod eglot-initialization-options ((server eglot-deno))
    "Passes through required deno initialization options"
    (list :enable t
    :lint t))

Pulsar Jump to heading

The Pulsar editor, formerly known as Atom supports integrating with the Deno language server via the atom-ide-deno package. atom-ide-deno requires that the Deno CLI be installed and the atom-ide-base package to be installed as well.

Sublime Text Jump to heading

Sublime Text supports connecting to the Deno language server via the LSP package. You may also want to install the TypeScript package to get full syntax highlighting.

Once you have the LSP package installed, you will want to add configuration to your .sublime-project configuration like the below:

{
  "settings": {
    "LSP": {
      "deno": {
        "command": ["deno", "lsp"],
        "initializationOptions": {
          // "config": "", // Sets the path for the config file in your project
          "enable": true,
          // "importMap": "", // Sets the path for the import-map in your project
          "lint": true,
          "unstable": false
        },
        "enabled": true,
        "languages": [
          {
            "languageId": "javascript",
            "scopes": ["source.js"],
            "syntaxes": [
              "Packages/Babel/JavaScript (Babel).sublime-syntax",
              "Packages/JavaScript/JavaScript.sublime-syntax"
            ]
          },
          {
            "languageId": "javascriptreact",
            "scopes": ["source.jsx"],
            "syntaxes": [
              "Packages/Babel/JavaScript (Babel).sublime-syntax",
              "Packages/JavaScript/JavaScript.sublime-syntax"
            ]
          },
          {
            "languageId": "typescript",
            "scopes": ["source.ts"],
            "syntaxes": [
              "Packages/TypeScript-TmLanguage/TypeScript.tmLanguage",
              "Packages/TypeScript Syntax/TypeScript.tmLanguage"
            ]
          },
          {
            "languageId": "typescriptreact",
            "scopes": ["source.tsx"],
            "syntaxes": [
              "Packages/TypeScript-TmLanguage/TypeScriptReact.tmLanguage",
              "Packages/TypeScript Syntax/TypeScriptReact.tmLanguage"
            ]
          }
        ]
      }
    }
  }
}

Nova Jump to heading

The Nova editor can integrate the Deno language server via the Deno extension.

GitHub Codespaces Jump to heading

GitHub Codespaces allows you to develop fully online or remotely on your local machine without needing to configure or install Deno. It is currently in early access.

If a project is a Deno enabled project and contains the .devcontainer configuration as part of the repository, opening the project in GitHub Codespaces should just "work". If you are starting a new project, or you want to add Deno support to an existing code space, it can be added by selecting the Codespaces: Add Development Container Configuration Files... from the command pallet and then selecting Show All Definitions... and then searching for the Deno definition.

Once selected, you will need to rebuild your container so that the Deno CLI is added to the container. After the container is rebuilt, the code space will support Deno.

Kakoune Jump to heading

Kakoune supports connecting to the Deno language server via the kak-lsp client. Once kak-lsp is installed an example of configuring it up to connect to the Deno language server is by adding the following to your kak-lsp.toml:

[language.typescript]
filetypes = ["typescript", "javascript"]
roots = [".git"]
command = "deno"
args = ["lsp"]
[language.typescript.settings.deno]
enable = true
lint = true

Helix Jump to heading

Helix comes with built-in language server support. Enabling connection to the Deno language server requires changes in the languages.toml configuration file.

[[language]]
name = "typescript"
language-id = "typescript"
scope = "source.ts"
injection-regex = "^(ts|typescript)$"
file-types = ["ts"]
shebangs = ["deno"]
roots = ["deno.json", "deno.jsonc", "package.json"]
auto-format = true
language-servers = ["deno-lsp"]

[language-server.deno-lsp]
command = "deno"
args = ["lsp"]

[language-server.deno-lsp.config.deno]
enable = true

Shell completions Jump to heading

Built into the Deno CLI is support to generate shell completion information for the CLI itself. By using deno completions <shell>, the Deno CLI will output to stdout the completions. Current shells that are supported:

  • bash
  • elvish
  • fish
  • powershell
  • zsh

bash example Jump to heading

Output the completions and add them to the environment:

> deno completions bash > /usr/local/etc/bash_completion.d/deno.bash
> source /usr/local/etc/bash_completion.d/deno.bash

PowerShell example Jump to heading

Output the completions:

> deno completions powershell >> $profile
> .$profile

This will create a Powershell profile at $HOME\Documents\WindowsPowerShell\Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1, and it will be run whenever you launch the PowerShell.

zsh example Jump to heading

You should have a directory where the completions can be saved:

> mkdir ~/.zsh

Then output the completions:

> deno completions zsh > ~/.zsh/_deno

And ensure the completions get loaded in your ~/.zshrc:

fpath=(~/.zsh $fpath)
autoload -Uz compinit
compinit -u

If after reloading your shell and completions are still not loading, you may need to remove ~/.zcompdump/ to remove previously generated completions and then compinit to generate them again.

zsh example with ohmyzsh and antigen Jump to heading

ohmyzsh is a configuration framework for zsh and can make it easier to manage your shell configuration. antigen is a plugin manager for zsh.

Create the directory to store the completions and output the completions:

> mkdir ~/.oh-my-zsh/custom/plugins/deno
> deno completions zsh > ~/.oh-my-zsh/custom/plugins/deno/_deno

Then your .zshrc might look something like this:

source /path-to-antigen/antigen.zsh

# Load the oh-my-zsh's library.
antigen use oh-my-zsh

antigen bundle deno

fish example Jump to heading

Output the completions to a deno.fish file into the completions directory in the fish config folder:

> deno completions fish > ~/.config/fish/completions/deno.fish

Other tools Jump to heading

If you are writing or supporting a community integration using the Deno language server, you will find documentation located in the Deno CLI code repository, but also feel free to join our Discord community in the #dev-lsp channel.

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