Disable VS Code command keybinding when Command Palette is open

Question

tl;dr: How can I disable a command keybinding while the Command Palette is open?

I'm developing an extension that makes a webview. When the webview is active, I have some commands that can be invoked by a single letter with no modifiers:

  "keybindings": [
    {
      "command": "visual-scxml-editor.toggleEventDisplay",
      "key": "e",
      "when": "visual-scxml-editor.visualEditorActive"
    },

This works well, except that if the user opens the Command Palette they can no longer type those characters.

Per that link, I feel this is a bug. However, I cannot wait for the bug to be fixed. (And, I can imagine a turtles-all-the-way-down argument that requires keybindings to be processed even when the command palette is open and has keyboard focus, such that the behavior won't ever be changed.)

I don't see a when clause context that would allow me to disable this binding when the command palette is open. Are there any events or callbacks or other tricks I can listen for to discover when the command palette is open vs. closed?

The only other workaround I can think of is to not use keybindings at all for such commands, instead processing these keyboard events myself in the webview:

document.body.addEventListener('keydown', evt => {
  switch (evt.code) {
    case 'KeyE':
      this.toggleEventDisplay();
      evt.preventDefault();    
    break;
  }   
});

score 0 · Accepted Answer · answered Feb 27 '23 at 04:12

While the listFocus context does not apply to the command palette, the inputFocus context does. So, the answer is as simple as:

"keybindings": [
    {
      "command": "visual-scxml-editor.toggleEventDisplay",
      "key": "e",
      "when": "visual-scxml-editor.visualEditorActive && !inputFocus"
    },

Disable VS Code command keybinding when Command Palette is open

1 Answers1