Open and organize files

The Explorer holds the project tree, and Quick Open jumps straight to a path without browsing for it.

How to do it

1. Open Quick Open and type any part of a path; matching is fuzzy, so "intro" finds sections/introduction.tex.
2. Use New File, New Folder and Upload at the top of the Explorer, or drop files from your desktop straight onto the tree.
3. Drag a file onto a folder to move it; its context menu also offers Open, Copy Path, Rename, Download and Delete.
4. Click a file to open it; typing stays in the Explorer, so you can press Enter on Mac or F2 on Windows to rename it. Arrow keys move the selection; Delete removes it.
5. Images, PDFs, diagrams (.drawio), notebooks (.ipynb) and Office documents open in a preview pane instead of a text editor.
6. In Quick Open, type > to run a command, or : and a number to go to that line of the open file.

Ctrl+P opens Quick Open; Ctrl+Shift+E moves focus to the file tree, and pressing it again or Escape returns to the editor.

Move, copy and link files

The Explorer works on several files at once, and it keeps the paths written in your sources in step with where the files are.

How to do it

1. Hold Shift with the arrow keys to select several items, then cut, copy and paste them with the usual keys or with Cut, Copy and Paste on the context menu.
2. Download as ZIP on the context menu downloads a folder or the whole selection, and Upload Folder… brings in a folder with everything in it.
3. After you move or rename a file, a notice tells you how many references still name its old path; choose Preview to see each rewrite, or Update to apply them all.
4. Drag a file from the Explorer into the text and hold Shift as you drop it to insert the file's path there.

Split the workspace into panes

Every tab can be moved into its own pane, so the source, a second file and the PDF stay visible together.

How to do it

1. Right-click a tab, or use the command palette, to split the editor left, right, up or down.
2. Drag a tab onto another pane to move it there, or onto a pane's edge to create a new split.
3. Pin important tabs from their menu; pinned tabs stay on a separate top row and are protected from shortcuts and bulk close commands.
4. Expand the focused pane to work on one file for a moment without closing the others.
5. Close Others, Close to the Right and Close All are on the same tab menu.

Ctrl+Shift+W closes the active tab; Ctrl+W works only in the installed app, because browsers reserve it. F6 and Shift+F6 move focus between the sidebar, the editor panes, the bottom panel and the AI panel. Ctrl+PgDn and Ctrl+PgUp switch tabs, and with Shift added they move the active tab; a browser on Windows or Linux keeps those keys, so switch with Ctrl+F6 and Ctrl+Shift+F6 there and move tabs from the command palette. On a Mac, ⌘⌥→ and ⌘⌥← also switch tabs. Ctrl+1 through Ctrl+9 switch to the tab at that position. To resize panes, Tab to the divider between them and press the arrow keys.

Search and replace across the project

The Search view scans every text file in the project, not just the open ones.

How to do it

1. Open Search from the activity bar or its shortcut, then type your query.
2. Toggle Match Case or Use Regular Expression, and open the details row to add include and exclude globs such as *.tex or opencode/**.
3. Show Replace to edit the matches in place; Replace All is disabled while results are incomplete, so narrow the filters first.
4. Generated and binary files (.pdf, .svg, .aux, .ipynb, lock files) are skipped unless an include pattern names them.

Ctrl+Shift+F opens the Search view; Ctrl+F searches only the file you are editing.

Run commands and adjust the editor

The command palette lists the project's actions alongside every action the code editor itself provides.

How to do it

1. Open the palette and start typing — compile, sync to PDF, insert a citation, open settings, split panes and formatting commands are all there.
2. Toggle the sidebar or the bottom panel when you need more room for the source.
3. Turn word wrap, the minimap and spell check on or off from the palette; the choices are remembered for you.
4. Open Project settings from the palette for compile, root document and project-wide options.
5. Run Toggle Writing Focus to hide the sidebar, the bottom panel and the AI panel and to turn on Focus Mode and Typewriter Scrolling while you write; press Escape to leave it.
6. To keep either effect all the time, open Project settings, go to Editor and turn on Focus Mode, which dims every paragraph except the one you are writing in, or Typewriter Scrolling, which keeps the current line centered.

Ctrl+Shift+P or F1 opens the palette; Ctrl+Shift+B toggles the sidebar; Ctrl+` toggles the bottom panel; Ctrl+Alt+B toggles the AI panel; Alt+Z toggles word wrap; Ctrl+Alt+Z toggles Writing Focus.

Edit with Vim keys

The editor can use Vim's modes and commands in place of its own keys.

How to do it

1. Open Project settings, go to Editor and choose Vim under Keyboard, or run Toggle Vim Keys from the command palette; the choice is saved to your account and follows you to every device you sign in on.
2. The status bar shows the mode and the keys typed so far, and : and / open their prompt there.
3. Saving is continuous, so there is no file to write: :w compiles instead, :q closes the tab, and :wq or :x compiles and then closes.
4. u and Ctrl-R undo and redo only your own edits, never a collaborator's.
5. On Windows and Linux, Ctrl+S, Ctrl+P and Ctrl+J keep their usual meaning in every mode; outside insert mode the other Control keys Vim uses, such as Ctrl+F, Ctrl+B, Ctrl+D and Ctrl+U, are Vim's. On a Mac nothing changes, because the app's shortcuts use Cmd.

:w compiles; :q closes the tab; :wq or :x compiles, then closes; :e opens Go to File; :sp and :vs split the editor; gt / gT and :bn / :bp switch tabs; Ctrl-W then w, l or j moves to the next pane, and Ctrl-W then h or k to the previous one.