Easy Telescope-style file finder in Zed

[baldwindavid]

There's a been a lot of discussion about telescope-style search in #8279. There's some good workarounds/ideas there, but just posting a drop-in setup that leverages television, a task, and keybinding.

1. Install television

2. Add a task for a file finder

tasks.json

{
  "label": "file_finder",
  "command": "zed \"$(tv files)\"",
  "hide": "always",
  "allow_concurrent_runs": true,
  "use_new_terminal": true
},

3. Add keybinding to open file finder in center terminal

keymap.json

// replace file_finder::Toggle
"cmd-p": [
  "task::Spawn",
  { "task_name": "file_finder", "reveal_target": "center" }
],

This should result in an interaction similar to...

2025-01-02T184704.mp4

Searching file contents

Television can search just about anything so, for example, file contents could also be searched with the text channel.

{
  "label": "fulltext_search",
  "command": "zed \"$(tv text)\"",
  "hide": "always",
  "allow_concurrent_runs": true,
  "use_new_terminal": true
},

[morgoth]

@baldwindavid Thanks. This works nicely, however when I open the search the lookup is done through some random files only and not all my workspace. Do you know how to configure that?

[baldwindavid]

I'm not too sure. What do you mean by "random" files? Are they a subset of the files in your Zed project or files from outside the project?

If outside, perhaps you need to specify ZED_WORKTREE_ROOT in the task with something like "zed \"$(tv files ${ZED_WORKTREE_ROOT})\"",

If it's the wrong files, you might need to tell television what files you want to include. Television can take a custom source for files and a custom previewer, but we're getting past the easy drop-in here. At any rate, here's an example that pipes all elixir file names in the ~/Code path from fd to tv and uses bat to preview...

fd -e ex . ~/Code | tv --preview 'bat -n --color=always {}'

In theory, you could use something like find, fd, etc to limit your set of files to the extensions you want and in the directory you want and then pass to tv. If you try this route I'd suggest getting it to work via terminal outside of Zed before trying to use it in a task.

Maybe there's an easy answer, but I don't know. It just works for me without messing with the list of files as far as I have seen.

[morgoth]

Looks like it works correctly.
I'm having few "folders" open, ie few projects and when I'm on some file in one "project folder" the search is not including other "project folders", but that's fine.
Thank you.

[dBangos]

Thanks, this works really well! Had to change the task as so

{
  "label": "File Finder",
  "command": "zeditor \"$(tv files)\"",
  "hide": "always",
  "allow_concurrent_runs": true,
  "use_new_terminal": true
}

because zed's name on linux (at least on my install) is zeditor. Really simple but might save someone a minute or two :)

[eddiebergman]

Many thanks @baldwindavid

Also adding a little something.

I usually use alt-j, alt-k for navigating menus. This wasn't
going through to the terminal fully (but also television through my terminal didn't like those keys).

Anywho, this worked for me.

{
    "context": "Terminal",
    "bindings": {
      // "ctrl-/": "workspace::ToggleBottomDock",
      "alt-j": ["workspace::SendKeystrokes", "down"],
      "alt-k": ["workspace::SendKeystrokes", "up"]
    }
  }

[failable]

That's awesome, thanks. Works like a charm except the builtin terminal is a bit slow.

[universalmind303]

came here to say the same thing. There's very noticeable delay between entering the command and when the finder is opened and ready. Much more so than spawning it in an existing terminal

[thomdabrowski]

I added a bash shell, and it improved the speed slightly:

tasks.json

[
  {
    "label": "File Finder",
    "command": "zed \"$(tv files)\"",
    "hide": "always",
    "allow_concurrent_runs": false,
    "use_new_terminal": true,
    "shell": {
      "program": "/bin/bash"
    }
  },
  {
    "label": "Find in Files",
    "command": "zed \"$(tv text)\"",
    "hide": "always",
    "allow_concurrent_runs": false,
    "use_new_terminal": true,
    "shell": {
      "program": "/bin/bash"
    }
  }
]

keymap.json

"cmd-p": [
  "task::Spawn",
  { "task_name": "File Finder", "reveal_target": "center" }
],
"cmd-f": [
  "task::Spawn",
  { "task_name": "Find in Files", "reveal_target": "center" }
]

[eddiebergman]

It's most likely the startup files contained in your .bashrc/.zshrc files, along with whatever other code they run on shell launch.

You can put it as bash --noprofile --norc to force it not to load it, same for most shells. I just did a test and it seems to work with sh as well which should be even faster to start up.
sh --noediting --norc --noprofile. You might need to put tv on you $PATH env var such that you don't need any profile config files to find it. For example, in your /usr/bin, milage may vary.

[xinxnm]

Running cmd-f on a remote box doesn't seem to work. Initially, it looks like something fails because the remote box requires the zed binary to exist. After installing zed on the remote box, running cmd-f and selecting a file just shows a blank buffer.

[piotreknow02]

Thank you so much @baldwindavid! This is awesome.
Has anyone here tried to bring the telescope-style live grep? I've been looking for a way to do this with tv's cable channels, but I don't see a way to pass a search term into source_command

[piotreknow02]

Update: I got it to work.

  {
    "label": "Live Grep",
    "command": "zed \"$(tv text)\"",
    "hide": "always",
    "allow_concurrent_runs": true,
    "use_new_terminal": true,
    "shell": {
      "program": "sh"
    }
  }

Hope that helps someone!

[Freyskeyd]

Hey @baldwindavid !

Thanks for this awesome task ! I've a corner case tho that is a little bit messing with my brain.
I'm using vim-mode and if I yank a text, like a variable or something, then open "File Finder" then paste, the text is completely messed up.
I'm not sure if it is from my setup or a problem with using this with zed. Any of you have that?

I'm on Macos, with latest zed and television.

thanks !

[baldwindavid]

I don't encounter that issue and use vim mode. Just as a test you might change that command to something like "command": "top", just to eliminate tv being involved at all as a cause. If the same issue is happening then it would probably have something to do with your keybindings.

[Freyskeyd]

All other commands seem to work well, I tried to just open vim and paste to the clipboard and it works.
I think the problem is in television, and related to this

[baldwindavid]

Ah, the author fixes bugs real quick over there so I'm sure it will get worked out.

[Freyskeyd]

Yeah, I updated to main and it works !

My next problem to solve is, how to search for a file, and open it on the right of the current one^^

[morgoth]

FYI: after update to zed 0.173.8, this stopped working due to #24833
The fix is to change "label" of the task to something like "file_finder"

[0xdapper]

A custom channel that searches over open files would be nice too. But I don't think the zed cli is capable of getting that information.

[1925381584]

@baldwindavid hi, I looked your video and find you open a file in the same instance of zed, but I will open a new zed window, what's the problem? Is it because I'm using it under Windows? Thank you for your provide anyway

[baldwindavid]

Maybe? I do know that Zed does not have official support for Windows yet.

[1925381584]

I found that the zeditor installed through msys2 works effectively.

[thaodangspace]

It's working good with local development, but seem like it can't open the file when using SSH remote development mode.

[xinxnm]

Ran into this issue as well - installing television on the remote box fixes this issue.

[dkmar]

another

{
    "label": "Live Grep",
    "command": "tv text --no-remote --no-help --tick-rate 120 | read -alz res; and zed $res",
    "hide": "always",
    "allow_concurrent_runs": false,
    "use_new_terminal": false,
    "shell": {
        "with_arguments": {
            "program": "fish",
            "args": ["--no-config"]
        }
    }
}

[bisho]

Television allows selecting multiple files (using tab to toggle), so zed \"$(tv... will fail in that case. To better handle this you can pipe to xargs (linux) / gxargs (mac, after installing brew install findutils):

[
  {
    "label": "FF",
    "command": "tv files \"${ZED_WORKTREE_ROOT}\" | gxargs --delimiter '\n' -n 1 zed",
    "hide": "always",
    "allow_concurrent_runs": false,
    "use_new_terminal": true,
    "shell": {
      "program": "/bin/dash"
    }
  },
  {
    "label": "FiF",
    "command": "tv text \"${ZED_WORKTREE_ROOT}\" | gxargs --delimiter '\n' -n 1 zed",
    "hide": "always",
    "allow_concurrent_runs": false,
    "use_new_terminal": true,
    "shell": {
      "program": "/bin/dash"
    }
  }
]

EDIT: Added -n 1 so pressing Esc to cancel and not open a file does not open a new zed window.

Note: On macs, the default xargs is the ancient BSD version that doesn't support --delimiter. if you don't want to install or use the "gnu" xargs, you can still use tr to convert newlines to \0 and use the BSD xargs. Eg: | tr '\\n' '\\0' | xargs -0 -L 1 zed

[AlexEne]

This doesn't open the file in zed once i select it (maybe because it's opened in another tab?). Is there something i could try or logs I can look at to see what went wrong?

[bisho]

Maybe you didn't install the CLI tools? The zed command needs to be installed.

select Zed > Install CLI from the application menu:

[TomzBench]

I have the same issue, i installed from source. i have the cli tool in my path. But it seems that calling zed always opens in a new workspace. Perhaps something is missing from my install vs a more official install.

I noticed on development installs there is ~/.local/zed-dev.app/libexec/zed-editor. I tried using this binary instead of ~/.local/bin/zed but the file will still open in a new workspace

[itisyb]

how to ignore node_module or full gitignore files

[bisho]

television does ignore files honoring the .gitignore file already. But if you need custom filtering, tv accepts a list of entries in stdin:

fd <your custom filtering> | tv files

[TomzBench]

This seems to work great except when i select the file, it pops out in an entirely new zed instance and not as a new tab as i would of expected

[gs-jdudulski]

When I ESC on television finder it opens an empty file outside the project context. Is there a way to configure it so in such case it will go back to the file that was opened?

[dkmar]

yeah i think you wanna make the zed invocation conditional on whether the selection of files is non-empty. My fish shell version looks like

tv text | read -alz res; and zed $res

so the zed command only runs if there's a selection for read to consume

in total:

  {
      "label": "Live Grep",
      "command": "tv text | read -alz res; and zed $res",
      "hide": "always",
      "allow_concurrent_runs": false,
      "use_new_terminal": false,
      "shell": {
          "with_arguments": {
              "program": "fish",
              "args": ["--no-config"]
          }
      }
  }

[gs-jdudulski]

Works, thanks!

[mkcode]

Thank you @baldwindavid! This discussion inspired me to look into this style more deeply. I found that preferred the bat and fzf combo to television. The results are in a new discussion here: #38606

[friday]

Great guide!

Things that helped me that wasn't documented in the discussion post:

• If (like me) you never used television before, run you need to update the "channels" first tv update-channels (optional --force).
• Replace zed with zeditor if your zed command is zeditor (Linux and maybe others)
• Add --exact flag after tv if you don't want fuzzy search (fuzzy "find in files" is pure madness)
• Add --input '${ZED_SELECTED_TEXT:-}' after tv to pre-populate with the selected text.

This is what I adapted the suggestion to for "find in files" in tasks.json:

[
  {
    "label": "tv:find-in-files",
    "command": "zed \"$(tv --input '${ZED_SELECTED_TEXT:-}' --exact text)\"",
    "hide": "always",
    "allow_concurrent_runs": true,
    "use_new_terminal": true
  }
]

(actually I use zeditor, but for most others it will be zed)